https://theecowell.com/blogs/well.atomThe Eco Well - Well2019-01-14T17:01:00-05:00The Eco Wellhttps://theecowell.com/blogs/well/the-low-down-on-vitamin-c-for-skincare2019-01-14T17:01:00-05:002019-01-15T10:54:03-05:00The Low-Down on Vitamin C for SkincareJen NovakovichVitamin C is a pretty trendy ingredient right now for cosmetics, but what should you know when your purchasing or formulating products with it? Notoriously unstable in formulation, what steps can you take to ensure you’ve got a good product with functional vitamin C? How does vitamin C impact the health of your skin? How does it function in a formulation? What are the forms out there? In this blog post, we’ll go through all these questions and more. Warning, this post is quite technical, but a thorough dive into the topic for anyone looking for these details. Enjoy!

What is vitamin C?

Vitamin C, otherwise known as ascorbic acid and L-ascorbic acid, is a water-soluble vitamin found in lots of different foods, especially fruits and veggies. Ascorbic acid is a weak sugar acid that’s structurally related to glucose. Overall, vitamin C is a very important antioxidant and is required for several important body functions, such as in our immune system and tissue repair following an injury. Unlike plants and certain animals, due to the lack of an enzyme, humans are unable to make vitamin C in our bodies. As a result, getting enough through the diet is super important. Aside from protecting you from things like scurvy and lowering your risks for different chronic diseases, vitamin C also plays a big role in the health of your skin.

Vitamin C and Skin Health

Vitamin C is the most abundant antioxidant in the skin and plays an important role in its health, easily demonstrated by the impacts of deficiency, which is linked with impaired wound healing, UV damage, fragile skin and more. Normal skin, surprisingly, has a very high content of vitamin C, at comparable levels to other areas of the body. More surprising than that, the epidermis, the outer layer of your skin, has more vitamin C in it compared to the dermis, with differences between 2-5 fold between the two layers being consistently reported. Why is this surprising? The epidermis is characterized by a lack of blood vessels, the normal delivery method for nutrients throughout the body, whereas the dermis still has blood vessels throughout. The high concentration at the epidermis would mean that vitamin C actively diffuses here, which is a pretty good indication that this vitamin has an important role to play for skin health. Vitamin C is important for collagen formation, scavenging free radicals, stopping melanogenesis (i.e. age spots and hyperpigmentation), wound healing, and lots more. As you can probably imagine, all of this can have a big impact on how your skin looks as you age.

Throughout the course of your life, your skin is exposed to a number of different challenges, which in turn result in oxidative stress (free radicals) - think harsh weather, pollution, sun exposure, and harsh beauty products. These challenges are linked with depletion of vitamin C levels in your epidermis. As you age, vitamin C levels in your skin will lower, but your lifestyle can seriously compound this. For example, sun exposure and smoking have both been demonstrated to markedly reduce vitamin C in your skin (as well as throughout your body, in the case of smoking). On the flip side, it’s been well documented that vitamin C is able to limit sun damage, which is an oxidative process… this all makes a lot of sense when you think about how antioxidants generally act in the body (diagram below).

Having sufficient levels of vitamin C throughout your body, which you can get through your diet, seems to do the job at making sure you’ve got good levels in your skin. The old adage that beauty comes from within couldn’t ring any truer here. Having a healthy lifestyle and good nutrition generally bodes well for having healthy looking skin.

Here’s a quick rundown of the available evidence that I felt had sufficient enough significance and weight to mention.

2 human studies have demonstrated an increase in skin vitamin C following supplementation. Note, neither adequately measured blood vitamin C levels before and after the study. In a study that measured vitamin C in buccal keratinocytes of the skin, the vitamin C concentration doubled after supplementation with 3g/day (significantly higher than the recommended daily intake) for 6 weeks. In a study by Nusgens and colleagues, skin levels of vitamin C didn’t increase further after ‘plasma saturation was reached’ - i.e. once your cells have enough vitamin C, you’re not going to be able to get any more in there.

In a recent systematic review of studies, they found that intervention with vitamin C intake was associated with improvements in skin elasticity, facial wrinkling, roughness, and color. These interventions where either via vitamin C from supplements or from the diet, fruits, and veggies.

It’s well established that vitamin C limits damage from sun exposure, as this injury is mediated by free radicals/oxidation. Demonstrated both in cell and animal studies with both topical and dietary intake of vitamin C. Note, vitamin C was only minimally effective on its own. Studies with the best results used multiple components, notably vitamin E has a synergistic effect that is particularly effective. *Efficacy depended on the pre-existing vitamin C status of the skin*.

One study suggested that when health status was already optimal, there was no absorption of vitamin C following topical application.

There has not been convincing evidence that vitamin C topically or via supplements noticeably reduces wrinkles, although research here has been restricted by technology with actually measuring this until recently. There is an indication that improved vitamin C status can improve collagen production, which ultimately may improve wrinkles… but only if the person has deficient stores. Impacts where significant in smokers, compared with non-smokers with sufficient vitamin C already.

One study showed that supplementation with both vitamin c and e improved the rate of wound healing in children with extensive burns. Again, this was only seen when vitamin C levels were deficient.

Take homes:

Vitamin C has been demonstrated to impact the look of the skin, especially regarding hyperpigmentation, and wound healing.

Like many other nutrients, it appears that vitamin C levels in the skin respond to blood vitamin C levels.

Vitamin C interventions with supplements and topicals seem to only be effective if vitamin C levels are low.

Once you’re full up on your vitamin C, there’s no point of taking in anymore. Superdosing vitamin C, whether by a topical or supplement, especially if you already have good levels, is seemingly a waste of money, in terms of skin health at the very least, which is what we’re focused on here.

It seems like eating your fruits and veggies does a good job at ensuring you’ve got good vitamin C levels in your skin and throughout your body

Given that the skin is so burdened by free radical/oxidative challenges due to the fact that it’s our interface with the outside world, topical products with vitamin C may be worthwhile, especially if your skin has been damaged by the sun, elements or previous harsh beauty routine, since these lower skin vitamin C levels. Re- if your skin vitamin C levels are low, you’ll notice a bigger impact.

Vitamin C in cosmetic products

All of the above evidence aside, there are some big challenges when trying to incorporate vitamin C into your cosmetic products. The main one - many of the forms the vitamin comes in are very unstable and react readily when exposed to air or sunlight. I see this SO FREQUENTLY in products on the market claiming to have vitamin C in them. By the time they come into the hands of their customers, all the vitamin C has reacted, rendering that claim pure marketing. Have you ever bought a vitamin C product that came to you, or even throughout its life tuned, a golden to brownish color? That’s what generally happens when the vitamin C oxidizes. When you’re purchasing a vitamin C product, this is something to look for to make sure there’s some vitamin C left in it for your skin’s benefit. So what are the forms of vitamin C out there for cosmetics and how can we overcome this stability challenge?

The first and most popular form of the vitamin is L-ascorbic acid, the most biologically active and well studied. It’s water-soluble and very unstable - aside from product stability, this also results in a harder time penetrating the more fatty skin of your stratum corneum, the outer layer of the skin. L-ascorbic acid is also a charged molecule, which further reduces its ability to penetrate the skin. As a water-soluble and charged molecule, L-ascorbic acid is repelled by the skin overall. For cosmetic products, you can enhance this forms stability and ability to penetrate by lowering the pH of the product to below 3.5 (note, the pH of your skin is closer to 5.4, so this would be quite acidic). This improvement is largely because it transforms L-ascorbic acid from charged to uncharged. An example of a stabilized L-ascorbic acid product on the market is SkinCeuticals by L’Oreal, which achieved this by both a low product pH as well as the addition of ferulic acid, which further stabilized the vitamin (note, this is a patented technique). Other than that, my experience reviewing products with L-ascorbic acid in them overall is, way too many of the products I’ve seen with this ingredient are oxidized… again, having the oxidized ingredient in the product - not going to do much for your skin. To add to this, most everyday products will want to achieve a pH closer to 5.4, which is very problematic for vitamin C. pH adjusting L-ascorbic acid products to be more suitable to the pH of your skin will ensure that the L-ascorbic acid oxidizes and doesn’t penetrate.

Controversy in the cosmetics industry over vitamin C, this past year the company Drunk Elephant was sued by L’Oreal for patent infringement over SkinCeuticals mentioned above. Check out Vox’s coverage of the story here.

There has been lots of work put into the development of ascorbic acid derivatives for skincare to make them more stable and less likely to oxidize, especially at a pH closer to 5.4. Note, in order for them to be effective, these forms must be able to convert to ascorbic acid on application. One of the ways to stabilize vitamin C is by adding a phosphate group - these forms demonstrably are able to convert to ascorbic acid on application, although at a slow rate. Ascorbyl Glucoside, for example, has better stability and can penetrate the skin, but the conversation rate to ascorbic acid is still unknown. Derivatives with fat-soluble parts, like palmitate in the case of L-ascorbyl palmitate, are able to further assist delivery - animal studies here demonstrate an increase in uptake, although more research needs to be done to verify the conversion rate to ascorbic acid. Two other topical forms include ascorbyl-6-palmitate and magnesium ascorbyl phosphate. Unlike l-ascorbic acid, which is water-soluble and unstable, both of these are fat soluble, esterified forms that are stable at a neutral pH. Moreover, recent studies suggest that encapsulated molecules may be able to improve vitamin C penetration to the lower levels of the skin even more. I think at this point it’s worth bringing up the elephant in the room… efficacy for vitamin C products, in whichever form they come in, will be dependent on the vitamin C levels of the individual. If they’re already full up on their vitamin C, i.e. getting enough through their diet and taking good care of their skin, topical vitamin C won’t have a big impact.

What kind of dosage should you be looking for in your products? Ultimately, it seems that the optimal amount of vitamin C is dependent on the formulation. For example, if your using L-ascorbic acid, there’s pretty much no point of having any unless you’re bringing the final product pH below 4 and taking all the other steps to keep your product stable, such as putting the product in an airless tube and avoiding transparent packaging where the product is exposed to light. To add to that, formulations that are most effective incorporate other antioxidants, particularly vitamin E. In most cases, for a product to have significant vitamin C impacts, it seems that concentrations should be higher than 8%. Note, a recent clinical study with 3% vitamin C product used over a 4-month period showed a significant increase in skin vitamin C, and there have been quite a few other studies showing impacts at 5% and lower. Studies that looked at products with percentages over 20% usually came back as no more helpful than concentrations below. To add, these very high percentages had a higher likelihood of causing skin irritation. Overall, it seems that percentages between 10-20% will give you the best bang for your buck.

That’s a wrap! Questions, queries, conundrums or concerns? Leave em below or on any of our social media pages!

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/a-hyaluronic-acid-1012019-01-05T12:14:00-05:002019-01-05T13:03:25-05:00A Hyaluronic Acid 101Jen Novakovich
Hyaluronic acid is one popular ingredient in cosmetics at the moment. Touted to be the most potent humectant available, and an effective anti-aging active, are these claims actually backed by science? In this blog post, I went on a deep dive into all things hyaluronic acid. What is it, what does it do, and what should we know about this ingredient in the cosmetic products we purchase or formulate? Low molecular weight versus high molecular weight? I also broke down this debate and reviewed the available research about that conversation. Warning, this post is a wee bit technical, but if you’re looking to learn more about hyaluronic acid in cosmetics, we’ve got you covered!

What is hyaluronic acid?

Hyalruonic acid (HA) is a linear macromolecular mucopolysaccharide, essentially one huge unbranched molecule chain made up of lots of sugar units. Its chain is made up of alternatingly linked sugar (saccharide) units of glucuronic acid and N-acetylglucosamine. Also known as hyaluronan, it has a high molecular weight of roughly 105–107 Da. Below is what one unit of hyaluronic acid looks like structurally, a hyaluronic acid molecule contains thousands of these bad boys linked over and over again.

Hyaluronic acid (HA) is a naturally occurring polymer that plays a very important role in our biology and the biology of many other plants and animals out there. In fact, it has been evolutionarily conserved, all the way back to simple prokaryotes - a pretty good indicator that hyaluronic acid is one very important molecule. It’s a major element in the connective tissue in vertebrates (i.e. animals with spines) where it functions as scaffolding and support, is responsible for controlling things like tissue hydration, plays a role in cell signalling throughout the body, helps with wound healing and scarring, and is even found in the umbilical cords of babies, suggesting it may also help with tissue regeneration and growth. Hyaluronic acid is found in most connective tissues in body fluids, from synovial fluid to the humor of the eye.

A brief history of hyaluronic acid

Hyaluronic acid has long received a lot of attention among researchers because of its versatility as a very functional biopolymer. First discovered from the eyes of cows in 1934 by Karl Meyer and John Palmer, who in 1950, solved the chemical structure of the molecule naming it hyaluronic acid (derived from ‘hyalos’, the Greek word for glass plus uronic acid). Initially, hyaluronic acid was isolated in its acid form, but eventually they saw that the molecule behaved more like a salt in biology (sodium hyaluronate).

In 1942, Ender Balazs patented the first application of hyaluronic acid as a substitute for egg white in bakery products. The first biomedical application happened in the late 1950s when it was used for vitreous replacement during eye surgery. For medical applications, Hyaluronic acid was initially isolated from the umbilical cord and shortly later, from rooster combs. Later, hyaluronic acid was isolated from other sources and the investigative interest grew. Today, hyaluronic acid widely used for many applications, from helping in drug delivery, for patients with osteoarthritis, as a dermal filler, the ‘gold standard’ for fillers treating wrinkles, hydrating skin and increasing volume, and most relevant to this post, for cosmetic products.

One of the sources of hyaluronic acid, rooster combs. Hyaluronic acid is also commonly produced via bacteria fermentation today.

Skin aging and hyaluronic acid

Over time and due to things like sun exposure and gravity, your skin gradually goes through an aging process; the skin, soft tissue and skeletal support in the face changes, first resulting in wrinkles. Over time, aging skin causes things like flattening of the epidermal-dermal interphase, a deterioration of the dermis, loss of elasticity, less blood flow from a loss of blood vessels, poorer collagen content, poorer hydration and melanocyte activity, and so on. Visually, on top of wrinkles, this can be seen as skin thinning, hyperpigmentation, and sagging.

One of the reasons why there’s so much interest in hyaluronic acid, especially for aging skin, is because it’s heavily linked with this whole process. One very important property of the molecule is that it can hold onto a LOT of moisture; roughly 6L of water in just 1g! As a result, on top of structural support, it’s also a very potent humectant that helps keep moisture in the skin, aiding to its suppleness. One of the reasons youthful skin seems so hydrated is because it contains lots of hyaluronic acid in the dermis. As we age, this content decreases and by the time of adulthood, the content is as low as 5% of this baseline.To add to all of this, as we lose the hyaluronic acid in our skin, this also affects tissue volume and elasticity, also linked with hydration. It’s no wonder why hyaluronic acid is so popular as a dermal filler and in ‘anti-aging’ cosmetic products. Applied topically, hyaluronic acid has been shown to act as a potent humectant, can reduce the appearance of wrinkles, and helps to provide smoothness and softening to the skin. As a formulator, this ingredient, if the budget allows for it, is one that I find I’m often reaching to because I find it, anecdotally, pretty darn effective, even after one application of the product at a percentage as low as 0.5%.

The decrease of epidermal hyaluronic acid content is a hallmark of skin aging on the molecular basis (adapted from Necas et al 6 ).

High molecular weight vs low molecular weight hyaluronic acid

There’s a bit of confusion and debate about high and low molecular weight hyaluronic acid in cosmetics. While both are used in products, I often see low molecular weight hyaluronic acid being promoted as the superior option to formulators; it’s easier to incorporate into a formula and is better able to penetrate the skin because it’s so small. I’m just going to put it out there that I don’t think that it’s this simple… from going down a bit of a rabbit hole researching hyaluronic acid, it seems that they might be missing a very important point about hyaluronic acid as a therapeutic agent. Here I’ll try to clarify both sides, but to do that, I think it’s best to start with how the different weights of hyaluronic acid act in nature.

As I mentioned above, hyaluronic acid plays an important role in wound healing and scar formation. In its natural form, hyaluronic acid exists at a very high molecular weight. Upon environmental changes, for example pH changes in response to something like injury, enzymes are stimulated to start to break down hyaluronic acid to lower molecular weight fragments. Different weights of hyaluronic acid have been shown to influence macrophages of the immune system, important actors in wound healing, in different ways. As hyaluronic acid is broken down to lower molecular weight molecules, they seem to stimulate macrophages to have a pro-inflammatory response, one of the first steps to wound healing. In contrast, high molecular weight hyaluronic acid is demonstrated to stimulate an anti-inflammatory response from macrophages. Although these are two extreme affects, macrophages are multifaceted and often exist within a spectrum of these extremes. As a result of these interactions, low molecular weight hyaluronic acid has been found to contribute to scar formation, which was minimized when higher molecular weight hyaluronic acid was found in the wounded area. All this suggests that the different weights of hyaluronic acid play an important role together in wound healing. Where high molecular weight hyaluronic acid favored tissue integrity, fragments (low molecular weight) signalled injury and initiated the inflammatory response. Because hyaluronic acid impacts the immune system in this way, understanding these interactions more is crucial in the context of using it as a therapeutic agent.

In a 2015 study by Rayahin and colleagues, they highlighted these interactions; different molecular weights of hyaluronic acid was demonstrated to affect macrophage expression differently.Their findings suggested that therapeutically applied hyaluronic acid can alter macrophages in a molecular weight-dependent manner. After examining the impacts of different molecular weights of hyaluronic acid, they concluded that high molecular weight hyaluronic acid (in the megadaltons range) had an anti-inflammatory effect from macrophages while the lower molecular weight (smaller than 12 sugar molecule chains) hyaluronic acid stimulated an inflammatory response.Their results show that administration of high molecular weight hyaluronic acid is able to promote the resolution phase of wound healing, and removing this polymer is detrimental to the process. In contrast, administration of low molecular weight hyaluronic acid promoted inflammation and reduced its resolution. While this study offers a preliminary understanding of hyaluronic acid, it was simplified in a in-vitro (cell culture) model. Moving forward, in-vivo (i.e. in animal) studies will be important, considering our bodies are a whole lot more complex than a petri dish. Despite this, this study was the first to show that the molecular weight of hyaluronic acid can have these impacts on how macrophages act and should not be ignored, as I see it is most times in marketing about low molecular weight hyaluronic acid.

From this standpoint, it seems pretty straight forward that applying low molecular weight hyaluronic acid is probably not a good idea, and perhaps high molecular weight may be the better option. So why is low molecular weight so popular? One of the challenging characteristics of hyaluronic acid in its natural state for topical products is that these molecules are roughly 3000 nm in diameter. In contase, the intercellular space between your skin cells, which the molecule would have to penetrate to reach the deeper layers of your skin to have a profound impact, only 15 to 50 nm and just 6 to 10 nm at the hyaline membrane. This makes it impossible for high molecular weight hyaluronic acid to reach the deep layers of the dermis (note, this is actually a major challenge for formulators in general, actually getting the active ingredients to penetrate the skin, an idea that’s commonly confused by beauty bloggers. Does your cosmetic products penetrate your skin? Click here for our blog post all about this topic!).

Until recently, the only way to get hyaluronic acid to these deeper layers was by things like injecting across the skin barrier. Scientists at Forlle’d Laboratories in Japan managed to reduce the size of hyaluronic acid molecules all the way down to 5nm, allowing hyaluronic acid to cross the skin barrier when applied topically. After verifying that this very low molecular weight hyaluronic acid could indeed penetrate the skin, scientists conducted a clinical study to verify its effects. Summarizing the results, there was a significant moisturizing effect - after 2,4 and 8 weeks, the skin was significantly more hydrated than untreated skin. In addition, there was an improvement of skin elasticity after two weeks of treatment, which continued throughout the study. This study confirmed that smaller molecular weight hyaluronic acid topically had a greater skin penetration than higher molecular weight hyaluronic acid. Note, while these are usually the findings marketed by ingredient suppliers, this study happened one year before the 2015 study by Rayahin and colleagues above.

So what should formulators and brands be using? Low molecular weight hyaluronic acid that is better able to penetrate the skin but demonstrably may cause inflammation or skin irritation? Or high molecular weight hyaluronic acid that barely penetrates but doesn’t have the same inflammatory risks as its lower molecular weight counterpart? At this point, I’m going to say that more research is needed to clarify these questions. In my opinion, gathered from drawing ideas from the available research and my own anecdotal experience (i.e. opinion not fact :), my preference is the high molecular weight hyaluronic acid. While it’s really freaking tricky to incorporate into a formula - because of its high molecular weight, it absorbs a boat load of water, and if not incorporated carefully enough or if added at wee bit too high of a concentration, it can quickly turn your formula into a jelly mess that's virtually unworkable if your not careful - time and time again, I’m really impressed with how effective it is at making my skin look and feel great. While it may not be able to penetrate to the deep layers of the skin, it still has a very noticeable effect to the outer layers. In addition, the high molecular form of hyaluronic acid has a better hydrating effect than its low molecular counterpart, and keeping your skin hydrated is an important part of keeping it looking youthful. Regarding the better penetration of the low molecular weight version, I would say, don’t be fooled into thinking that it will be able to replace the lost hyaluronic acid in your dermis. Even with its low molecular weight, other components of a formula may affect it actually being able to penetrate, and even if it does, the effects will be transient (short-term), and for continued effects, it will have to be continually applied. Continual application of an ingredient that demonstrably promotes inflammation? Not something I’m particularly comfortable with, in light of my current understanding of the research.

And that’s a wrap! What do you think? Do you have a preference for high or low molecular weight hyaluronic acid in a formula? Have you used a product with hyaluronic acid that you loved? Join in on the conversation and share your thoughts below!

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/20182018-12-18T10:34:00-05:002018-12-18T10:34:45-05:002018 Review for The Eco WellJen NovakovichIt’s about that time of year to look back on the year behind me and get excited for the year ahead. Keeping with my yearly recap tradition, I wanted to share The Eco Well’s 2018 recap with all of you. Thank you for an incredible year!!

Formulating Classes

This year was a busy one! I upped my event schedule and grew across Ontario early in the year - lot’s of learning experiences, especially with respect to the fact that… 4 events in a week spanning from Ottawa to Windsor, maybe a wee bit too many and probably isn’t sustainable for me. I think I’ve now reached a sweet spot, especially now that I’ve started focusing on advanced classes. In September, we launched our first full day, 8 hours, formulating masterclass… A full day of me is a lot, and I wasn’t completely sure if this would be interesting enough to make it work for my students. Astonishingly, we’ve had a great turnout for each of these advanced sessions, which has made me so excited to expand on these in the new year. I’ve got so many ideas that I cannot wait to share through our events.

I had always envisioned The Eco Well as an education platform, but this year, I think this has actually become a reality. You may have noticed that we no longer have our own line of products. Instead, we now exclusively do educational classes and consulting, with a few acceptions for some of our local friends in business. Considering that this is what I love most in the work I do, I’m incredibly grateful that I’ve had the opportunity to grow my business this way. To all my amazing clients, customers and students, it’s because of all of you that I get to do what I love every day and I couldn’t thank you enough for this.

The Eco Market

In the summer of 2017, I got the crazy idea to launch my own conference. Despite the overwhelming opinion that this probably wasn’t a good idea, I decided to just go for it and see what happens. I kept seeing in my own community, the lack of support to non-tech ‘green’ and social enterprises, which seemed especially apparent in the tradeshows we had. For such a large community, why didn’t Kitchener-Waterloo have a ‘green-living’ style show? I spent about a year and a half working on this idea, and ended up launching The Eco Market in April of 2018. I have to admit that this is by far the hardest project I’ve ever taken on, especially in the 2 months leading up to the show… there where many points that I thought that I took on a wee bit too much for what I could handle. I was SO RELIEVED to see that The Eco Market conference was overall a big success. I think I was on edge for the whole month of April, but seeing the huge line at the door 2 hours before the show even started, I feel like that was such a weight off of my shoulders. We ended up having 2000 people through the doors, a full lineup of amazing vendors and speakers, and especially good reviews from my vendors, which to me was the most important. To all the volunteers that helped me out with The Eco Market, I literally could not have done this without your support! Extra big thank you to Jennifer Lyon and Allison Purdy, who went above and beyond helping me make The Eco Market a reality.

Here are a few pictures from the day.

After the show, being the person that I am, I now have a bigger goal for The Eco Market. Instead of just showcasing ‘green’, I want to do my part to support it in my region. Why can’t we have an innovation hub specific to ‘green’ and social innovation? We now have a 5 year strategy in place to get The Eco Market to where I want it to be, but so far, we host monthly networking events, frequent speaker and vendor showcases, have a podcast showcasing Canadian green innovation, and recently launched online forums to act as a tool to connect green and social entrepreneurs across Canada.

Coming up in 2019, we’re launching a pitch competition, happening February 27th in Kitchener (if you’d like to apply, applications are due January 14th), will be hosting the second edition of The Eco Market, happening April 27th at the Waterloo Region Museum, among a few other things. Currently, The Eco Market still falls under the umbrella of The Eco Well, but stay tuned, we’ll be launching it as a separate entity shortly!

Podcast

There are two big problems that I see right now in my industry, and I don’t know if they’re being well addressed. First, there is an overwhelming amount of misinformation in the cosmetics space. So many wacky ideas, misplaced fear mongering, inaccurate marketing, greenwashing…. It’s really easy to feel discouraged when the people who have influence seemingly don’t have a background in the subject. Second, I find scientists often stay behind closed doors… for many reasons, including I think, the alienation they often feel from consumers. There’s such a divide these days, and I think it’s doing a lot of damage, stunting the industry’s growth to be better and more sustainable, thoroughly confusing consumers, and allowing for unethical practices to sometimes dominate. Now, I do see some scientists coming forward to try to mitigate the problem, including Perry Romanowski from Chemists Corner, who I’ve come to really admire. But I think more of us need to also be doing this. My idea for The Eco Well podcast was to bring scientists out of their closed rooms, to have conversations with them about their expertise. By keeping things free to listen to for anyone anywhere, I hope that I can make accurate content more accessible to anyone interested. While The Eco Well podcast launched its first episode late 2017, I would say it really got its start in 2018.

At this point, I’ve had so many great conversations with so many incredible guests. To everyone who’s been a part of my show, thank you from the bottom of my heart for your time and support. Below are some of my favorite episodes of the year!

Other

2018 has been by far my most challenging year, filled with some of my highest highs and lowest lows. This year, my long-time partner James proposed on my 28th birthday (the day before The Eco Market) - of course, I said yes. He is the reason I had the courage to leave my career in the first place to start The Eco Well, has been my rock all along the way, and has even joined The Eco Well as my main tech guy… also, a big reason that my podcasts were able to get started, as I’m generally tech-illiterate. To add to the highs of 2018, other than business, I also generally take my summers off. I mean, I still work, just at a cottage up north without any obligations for in-person meetings and outings, leaving time to do what I love most, rock climbing. This summer, we also went on a big sailing trip through the North Channel. I can’t say that I was super excited for the long haul to the destination, 30+ hours of sailing through Lake Huron from the Lions Head Marina, with the company of our dog… But it was such an incredible, unique experience that we plan to have for many summers to come.

Photo credit to Michael Narimalla!

We also made this cute little addition to our family :)

For obvious lows, this year has also been by far the most expensive year. Launching new big things takes quite a bit of cash, and among that and incorporating The Eco Well, there were times that I really questioned my decision to have a business. This September though, my business really took a turn for the best, and my faith has been completely renewed. Having a business is A LOT of work and investment, but I’m so happy that we stuck things out to be where we are today and I’m so excited for the future of The Eco Well.

That’s a wrap for 2018! Aside from a bit of consultation work, we’re winding down for the year to spend time with our families and prepare for the year ahead. To everyone who’s supported The Eco Well in any way, THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!! Big thank you especially to Mike Jane, Jen Lyon, Allison Purdy, Kate Pearce, and Dayna Stein - each of you has been such a huge support for me throughout the year and I’m so incredibly grateful to have you all in my corner!

Happy holidays and new year!

Much love,

Jen

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/the-eco-well-2018-top-5-industry-favorites2018-12-12T09:01:00-05:002018-12-12T09:04:39-05:00The Eco Well 2018 Top 5 Industry FavoritesJen NovakovichIt’s hard to believe it’s already December - 2018 was a quick year for us, full of new opportunities, acquaintances and all around, exciting things. I’ve come across so many incredible companies doing amazing work this past year, innovating to make products better and more sustainable. This year, I decided to put together a list of my top 5 industry favorites, which I hope to make a tradition for years to come. Each company on my list has blown me away with the work they’re doing. Whether you’re seeking out new products to purchase or looking to a new raw material to formulate with, check out these outstanding companies!

5. Palette Natural

Led by American perfumer Miriam Vareldzis, Palette Naturals is a fragrance company hoping to lead the way in terms of transparency for the fragrance industry. Usually, when you flip over a package, you'll see the word 'fragrance'. Despite a lot of fear-mongering around this word, it's placed on labels to protect the proprietary formula. Fragrancing can be big business, and for a fragrance house, they don't generally want another fragrance house or perfumer to be able to replicate their scent. This idea really conflicts with the consumer needs of today, where we're looking for more information, to better understand the products we use so we can make more informed purchasing decisions. By hiding this information from the consumer, this has stunted this industries' ability to be transparent to their customers.

This was the idea behind Palette Naturals - a sophisticated natural fragrance company that offers full transparency regarding the raw materials used. Miriam has expertly designed a collection of 100% natural perfumery blending accords in compliance with the ISO 9235 definition of aromatic natural raw materials. Each accord is created by olfactive family, for beauty entrepreneurs, formulators, and chemists worldwide. Palette Naturals leaves it up to the companies they work with to disclose their fragrant ingredients.

Image from Ca Fleure Bon

Over the last 6 months, Miriam and I have really connected, and as a result, she’s come onto my podcast 3 separate times to talk about fragrance, each conversation as interesting as the last. Tune into our episodes together below!

4. Bio ForeXtra

Did you know that bark from the Canadian lumber industry was typically thought of as a waste product? A common practice was to throw the bark away, burn it or bury it after extracting the tree… kind of wasteful, especially because tree bark is a rich source of many beneficial constituents, such as polyphenols like resveratrol. In nature, they serve to do things like protecting the plant, but for us, there’s growing evidence demonstrating human benefits, including in skincare.

Dr. Mariana Royer saw this and dedicated her doctoral (University of French Guiana) and postdoctoral studies (Laval University in Quebec) conducting several research projects aiming to valorize bark and extract its bioactive molecules. Considering how underutilized bark is in the lumber industry, a major industry in Quebec, Mariana came up with her business idea to, not only produce novel active ingredients, but to help contribute to adding value to Quebec’s lumber sector, creating a missing link between the forest market via a circular economy concept, founding Les Laboratories Bio ForeXtra in 2013.

Image from Bio ForeXtra

Today, Bio ForeXtra develops natural extracts from forest biomass through the recycling of the tree bark that would have otherwise been waste products. Their extracts are eco-friendly options, with clinical data to back their efficacy, especially surrounding their impacts on mature skin, and moisturization. Very proud to have this company on an international stage for the industry representing Canadian science and innovation.

Below is a interview I did with Mariana in 2017 where we talked about the work she does. Note, this was one of my first podcasts so the quality can definitely be improved apon, but I thoroughly enjoyed the conversation and I think you will too!

3. Altilis Beauty

The first cosmetics brand to use breadfruit, the focal point of all of the products by Altilis Beauty. I’ve been watching this young company grow since the start and have been continually impressed by what their founder, Kenna Whitnell, is doing and her approach to sustainability. Natural is not synonymous with ‘green’ - many commonly used natural raw materials are arguably not sustainable. When choosing the ingredients used for a brand, especially if there are hopes of reaching consumers worldwide, I think a critical eye on sustainability metrics for each material used is important, and that’s what Altilis Beauty does.

In addition to sourcing sustainable ingredients, Kenna has developed her own raw ingredients, with the support of the University of British Columbia and the University of Guelph, from Breadfruit flowers, which she uses in each of her products. Outside of her ongoing research on breadfruit, Kenna's range of facial care products have been expertly formulated, using ingredients that are demonstrably effective, stable and sustainable. Science-based cosmetics is something that I’m a big fan of, so I fell in love with her product line. When using her facial care system, which includes a cleanser, serum, and moisturizer, my skin was noticeably more bright and healthy looking after just a few applications. PS, all of her products smell absolutely delicious, fragranced with breadfruit as well!

Learn more about our thoughts on sustainability, about what Kenna’s doing with her brand and why Breadfruit is a great sustainable raw material option through podcasts below!

2. Genomatica

I’m a big fan of biotech, as many of my podcast listeners will know. I think that this type of technology will be a crucial point for ensuring sustainable raw materials into the future. Fitting to be on this list, Genomatica is a global leader for bioengineering in the chemical industry. They’ve developed commercial biobased processes to make widely-used chemicals, once derived from petroleum, via biotech, enabling companies from many industries, including the cosmetics industry, to have more sustainable ingredient options. Genomatica enables a “better way” to produce chemicals, from alternative feedstocks, with better economics, sustainability, and performance. One of the biobased materials they’ve developed is biobased butylene glycol, heavily used in the cosmetics industry as a humectant and solvent.

Genomatica has received a lot of attention this past year for the amazing work they're doing. Something that made headlines, it seemed like everywhere, was that they were able to raise $90 MILLION in a round of fundraising! Among investors was Ginkgo Bioworks, who are expanding their work with Genomatica. I expect that this is going to really accelerate the work that they’re doing and lead to more exciting things for Genomatica over the next few years.

Learn more about the work Genomatica does through the following podcast, where I interviewed their Senior Vice President, Damien Perriman.

1. INOLEX

Innovative, continually working to be more sustainable, and all around, an amazing company to work with. INOLEX is a chemical manufacturer based in the USA that carries some of my favorite ‘green’ ingredients for formulation development. They’re constantly trying to develop new raw materials with the focus of efficacy and sustainability. Whenever I’m formulating a new product, I find myself always trying to reach for one of their ingredients because I think they’re really special. 3 ingredients that I’ve really come to love is their Emulsense HC, Vellaplex and Lexfeel N50.

Emulsense HC* is a natural cationic system derived solely from fermentation and plant materials - one of the few EcoCert approved cationic surfactants out that’s completely naturally derived. I’ve been really impressed with how Emulsense HC acts in formulation, comparable to some the other ‘synthetic’ cationic surfactants in function - an outstanding detangler, helps with shine and frizz, and leaves the hair feeling amazing… the product itself also smells oddly delicious and sweet. The above sample was a deep conditioning hair mask sample.

These mascara samples contained both their Lexfeel N50, a naturally derived silicone/dimethicone alternative with a lovely light feel, and Vellaplex, a naturally derived co-polymer, both EcoCert approved.

INOLEX has an incredible team of scientists who I've had the pleasure to connect with. One of them was Dr. Michael Fevola, a polymer scientist with a wealth of knowledge on the subject as it relates to cosmetics. Check out the podcast below, where I featured him in a conversation all about polymers in cosmetics, including the ones made by INOLEX.

That's a wrap! I hope you're feeling as inspired as I am about the companies featured on The Eco Well's Top 5 Industry Favorites for 2018! See you next year!

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/interview-by-kenna-from-altilis-beauty-of-jen-from-the-eco-well-about-science-sustainability-and-business2018-10-21T13:40:00-04:002018-10-21T13:45:58-04:00Interview by Kenna from Altilis Beauty of Jen from The Eco Well about science, sustainability and business.Jen Novakovich
Check out this video by our friend Kenna Whitnell from Altilis Beauty where she interviewed Jen about science, sustainability, and business! Loved this video and we thought you would too :). Enjoy!

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/3-simple-tips-for-great-looking-skin2018-09-16T10:02:00-04:002018-09-16T10:06:10-04:003 Simple Tips for Great Looking SkinJen NovakovichThere’s so much information out there on how we should be treating our skin for it to look great, and so many products out there. From chemical exfoliators like AHA creams, botanical infusions, toners, and the list goes on. I find so many people are always looking for that ‘it’ ingredient, the ingredient that’s going to zap their pimples, reduce their fine lines, brighten up their complexion. Of course, there are a few ingredients out there that can help with these, albeit not as many as people seem to think when we’re looking at evidence-based efficacy. Sometimes a better course of action is peeling back the layers of your skincare to a simple beauty routine. You really don’t need every type of facial care product for your skin to look great, and sometimes, other courses outside of cosmetics can have pretty big impacts. In this blog post, I laid out 3 tips to simplify your routine and help you achieve that healthy complexion.

Take a look at your diet & lifestyle

This is the best tip I can give you if you want your skin to look great. Too commonly, we undervalue the role that our lifestyle has on our overall health, including the health of our skin. Do you eat a lot of refined simple carbs/sugars? Since higher blood sugar, or swings in your blood sugar, often times results in inflammation, this can demonstrably exacerbate skin problems. Switch those simple sugars, think deserty foods or heavily refined breads, to complex carbs, think whole grains, not so sweet foods. It seems, from the bulk of the research out there, eating a lot of botanical variety, whole grains, less saturated fats (think meats, animal fats), more polyunsaturated fats (but not too much though)(think olive oil, seeds, avocados, certain fish)… this isn’t only better for your overall health, it’s also a great diet for you skin. Other things you can do, get your exercise in and stay hydrated. Of course there are foods that may be even better skin helpers, I’m thinking green tea, my personal go to whenever I’m breaking out. At the end of the day, by having a generally healthy diet and lifestyle, you’re a lot more likely to have nice looking skin!

To break things down here, check out the interview I did with Dr. Rajani Katta, research dermatologist with a focus on the link between diet and skin health. We talked about different dietary patterns and their relation to skin health, research about different foods that may exacerbate different skin conditions, and suggestions to eat for healthy looking skin.

Keep things simple

At the end of the day, what makes most of your facial care products effective isn’t the ‘actives’ in them, it’s everything else. For example, it’s the surfactants in your cleansers that make your skin feel so clean afterwards, it’s the emulsifiers and oily/humectant ingredients in your lotions that leave your skin feeling hydrated. Good formulations (e.g. stable, pH adjusted, effective for the product type) will generally trump the ‘actives’, although there are a few actives out there that can really amp up your products.

My go-to skin care routine is simple: wash your face with a cleanser (you can also use micellar water, which is often a more gentle way to cleanse your skin), follow up with a serum (optional, a great way to really hydrate your skin and, if your looking to get an impact from your ‘actives’, I find serums are the way to go), and seal that serum in with a cream or a lotion depending on your skin type (e.g. creams may be a better fit for drier skin whereas myself, who has combination skin, I tend to prefer lotions, which have less oil, more water than cream). It seems that keeping your skin hydrated is one of the best things you can do to keep your skin looking supple, and that’s why moisturizing is so important - it forms a barrier to prevent or reduce water loss through your skin (i.e. transepidermal water loss). If you do nothing else, cleansing, washing the daily grime away, followed by moisturizing, is an easy routine for great looking skin.

I also like to exfoliate once to twice a week, using a fabric cloth, which is cheap yet effective.. You can also invest in a cleansing brush, which can be lovely! I suggest avoiding larger grain products, for example sugar scrubs, which can sometimes be a little harsh on the more delicate skin of your face. When I’m wanting some extra pampering I’ll use a face mask, there’s lots to choose from out there. I personally do not use toners. While they can feel nice, despite what some people may tell you, they aren’t a key step for a good facial care routine, just a nice add in if you like them. Finally, when you go out into the sun, wear sunscreen and try to limit your sun time (e.g. with a hat, shade, or longer sleeves). Sun exposure early in your life can have a huge impact on how your skin ages. Missed the boat when you were young? It’s never too late to start wearing sunscreen!

For more on this, check out my interview with Dr. Katerina Steventon, skin biologist and international expert on skin care. We talked about different cosmetic product types, active ingredients, skin types and lot’s more.

Give facial exercise or massage a try

There’s really a limit to how much your cosmetic products can do for your skin. For example, your cosmetic products are probably not going to significantly affect the collagen in your skin, despite some bold claims out there, and as a result, not have a huge impact on skin wrinkles or sagging (note, if they can, they’ll more likely be regulated as drugs rather than cosmetic products). That’s where facial exercise and massage can come in, encouraging blood flow through the area, both can have a profound impact on the look of your skin.

There are many ways you can incorporate this into your skincare routine, some may be more suited for different skin types (e.g. massage, probably not the greatest tool for acne-prone skin, but excellent for mature skin). To take you through this topic, check out my other interview I did with Dr. Katerina Steventon, all about skin massage and exercise!

And that's a wrap! Questions, queries, conundrums or concerns? Leave them in the comments section or on any of our social media feeds. :)

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/fragrancing-part-3-synthetic-vs-natural-and-aroma-types2018-09-06T13:05:00-04:002018-09-06T13:05:13-04:00Fragrancing Part 3: synthetic vs natural and aroma typesJen NovakovichWhat’s the difference between synthetic and natural fragrances? What kind of fragrances are out there? These are two questions I get all the time in our workshops. Is natural always better? Why would we ever use synthetic notes? In this blog post, part 3 of our fragrancing series, I’ll take you through these questions and more so you’ll have a better understanding of fragrancing notes and the many options out there! Enjoy!

Natural VS Synthetic Aromas

In general, synthetic notes can be A LOT more simple than a natural aroma. When we talk about ‘synthetic’ in the cosmetic industry, what we often mean is the materials are derived from petrochemicals. Way back when, we got really good at extracting and refining petroleum into many different materials that today we rely on heavily, for example in many pharmaceuticals, packaging and plastics, and many cosmetic ingredients. Because of the chemistry of petroleum, compared to other starting materials, it’s incredibly easy to manipulate and we’ve gotten really good at doing so, hence its popularity. With synthetic notes, you can get single notes, for example, aldehyde, the characteristic note in Chanel No 5. In contrast, natural aromas are much more complex and naturally contain hundreds of aromatic chemicals.

I find thinking of accords are great ways of understanding this. An accord is essentially just a bunch of different chemicals working together to give you x aroma. For example, musks, amber, fruit (e.g. strawberry); these are blends of many synthetic notes to capture these scents. With synthetic notes, they’re often single notes, or you can put them together and create an accord. With natural notes, for example, an essential oil, these can really be thought of an accord from the get-go. Lemon essential oil, for example, can be made up of a-pinene, camphene, b-pinene, sabinene, linalool, limonene, nerol, and many other chemical components. Alone, they would not smell like a lemon, but together, that’s where the magic starts to happen! Many of these components can also be synthetic, e.g. nerol maybe. The huge benefit in perfumery of having these single notes is that you can create unique smells that would not be possible with natural aromas, fruity smells are a great example of that.

There’s an incredible amount of misinformation about fragrances. I always hear people saying that synthetic fragrances are way more allergenic than natural ones and that natural fragrances are always the eco option. Simply put, it’s not that cut and dry. Clearly, when we’re talking about sustainability, petrol-derived can never truly be sustainable because it’s non-renewable. But I think it’s important to always look at the flip side… Natural aromas can be sustainable, but sometimes they’re not. For example, if they’re taken from marginal habitats (e.g. some frankincense varieties), if they have glacial regrowth periods (e.g. sandalwood), if the plants are endangered (e.g. rosewood, some cedarwoods). Arguably, in these cases, synthetic notes, which we make pretty easily in a lab without a huge environmental effect, may be the more sustainable option. Coming to allergenicity, I think a lot of people will be surprised to hear that certain natural fragrances are actually among the most allergenic fragrances used in cosmetics today. Just because it’s potentially allergenic though, doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s going to cause you an allergy, just like synthetic notes. Ultimately, all fragrances are allergenic and all fragrances need to be used with respect and properly diluted to mitigate these risks.

There are thousands of different synthetic notes to choose from, as well as many pre-made synthetic accords to work with, for example, chypre, musks, fruit (e.g. pineapple), aquatic (e.g. beach or water ‘smells), green (e.g. grass) and gourmand (e.g. toffee) accords. In our last post about fragrances, we went through the various fragrance families. For more on this topic, click here to give it a read! Today there’s also a lot of research and development being put into biotech (which many may classify as synthetic); often fermentation reactions to create different aromas, chemically identical to their natural counterparts (i.e. nature identical). For example rose otto, which because of the fact it requires about 10000 lbs of plant material to often extract a single pound of essential oil, biotech might be the path forward for it, as well as many other natural aromas that are more intensive to produce. These natural fragrances, without biotech, will have a hard time surviving into the future with all of the pressures of our changing climate. If you’ve listened to my podcast, you’ll know that I’m a big fan of this research and it’s potential for sustainable ingredients, but that’s about all the detail I’ll go into about biotech fragrances. Today there’s really not that many biotech fragrances available to especially the smaller brands, but you can be sure that over the next 20 years, that’s going to probably change.

In contrast to synthetic perfumes, natural perfumery relies on natural aromas, which comes with their own unique challenges. Plants from different regions of the world will have their own unique chemical profile in their essential oils. For example, with lavender, in different regions of the world, some will contain a higher percentage of linalool, some a higher percentage of linalyl acetate, some may be more camphorous, and so on. This is because essential oils are really there to protect the plant and help it thrive in its environment. As things like climate, elevation, soil quality or pests vary, so will the constituents in the essential oils, and as the constituents change, so does the smell. To make things even more challenging, the constituents of the same plant will vary throughout the season as well. When you make a perfume for the market, you usually want it to consistently smell the same (which is why synthetic aromas are usually easier to work with), but because of all of these variations, that can be pretty tough in natural perfumery. Many industry perfumers will, as a result, only source their essential oils from specific locations and plants at a specific time of the year. Other things that can be a bit challenging include how complex essential oils compared to synthetic notes - usually, less is more in natural perfumery to avoid muddling the end smell. Finally, natural aromas typically have less longevity throughout the day then synthetic fragrances, although this can be combated by including more heavy base notes to help ‘ground’ the perfume. At the end of the day though, these challenges are part of the reason why I love natural perfumery.

Here's an example of small variations with ylang-ylang in chemical compositions between different samples of the same plant.

The rest of this blog post will focus on forms of natural aromas out there!

Essential Oils

These are the building blocks for natural perfumes. Essential oils are the aromatic (smelly) volatile (they’ll quickly evaporate and they’re super small molecules generally) chemicals of aromatic plants; they are secondary metabolites that, as I mentioned above, help plants thrive in their environments. Ultimately, all of the natural aromas include essential oils, but when we think of essential oils, we usually mean the ones that have been extracted via steam distillation or cold pressing. Note, both extraction methods can damage the constituents of an essential oil, resulting in not a complete profile of the smell. For example, because of the heat of steam distillation, some of the more volatile components of essential oils will often not survive the process. The overall temperature in general during steam distillation will have a big impact on the overall quality of the end essential oil. For more on essential oils, click here, and for more specifically on their chemistries, click here.

Here's a great infographic on how steam distillation works by Dr.EricZ.com

Absolutes

This process is typically used for plants that are more difficult to extract the essential oils efficiently, for example, jasmine or rose otto. Compared to the essential oils, because this process is more efficient at extracting the essential oils, absolutes will typically have a more complete profile of an aroma, chemically speaking. Absolutes are usually made via solvent extraction, which can vary from synthetic to natural solvents, e.g. petroleum ether, methanol, ethanol or hexane. The solvent pulls out the chlorophyll and other plant materials, resulting in a colored viscous solvent known as a concrete, which contains the waxes/fats as well as aromas. The concrete is then mixed with alcohol to extract the aromatic materials, this final product will be the absolute. The processed concrete can be used to form floral waxes, which are useful in solid perfumes. Absolutes are more commonly used in perfumery rather than aromatherapy, compared to the essential oils above.

These essential oils have been extracted via carbon dioxide. Carbon dioxide can be pressurized to become liquid, which can act as a solvent and produce aromatic oils similar to absolutes. CO2 is then brought back to the gaseous state to leave you with a CO2 Extract. The big advantage of CO2 extracts over other methods is that none of the constituents (or very little) are damaged during the process and you don’t really have to worry about solvent residue, such as in the case of absolutes. This method is a wee bit newer compared to the other extraction types but because of how efficient it is, I think over the next few decades it will become a lot more popular than it currently is. CO2 extracts can either be partial (i.e. CO2 Selects), which extracts only certain constituents and generally happens at a lower pressure, or complete (i.e. CO2 Totals), which happens at a higher CO2 pressure and captures pretty well all of the constituents.

And that’s a wrap! To avoid writing a book here, I think this is a good place to stop. Hopefully, after this post, you have a better understanding of the types of fragrance material out there and the differences between them. Questions, queries, conundrums or concerns? Leave them below in the comments section or on any of our social media feeds!

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/preservatives-part-two-effective-usage2018-08-14T13:43:00-04:002019-01-17T20:23:33-05:00Preservatives Part Two: Effective UsageJen NovakovichAs you may remember from our last post about preservatives, any time water is incorporated into your cosmetic products, with a few exceptions, looking to a preservative or preservation system is key to ensure you’ve got a safe end product. Not preserving it - you’re opening your formulations up to be a breeding ground for potentially very pathogenic bacteria. No matter how sterile the manufacturing space and packaging are and how careful we are making the products, as soon as water is introduced into a formulation, microbial growth is inevitable, especially considering how consumers usually treat their products (open jars in a steaming bathroom? Not the best habit for your beauty products). For more on this, read our guide to cosmetic preservatives - highly recommended before you dive into this article :). In this post, we’ll explore the details on how to actually choose and use preservatives effectively in your product formulations. This isn’t going to be an exhaustive review by any means, but hopefully, a good place to start to understand this important topic!

What do preservatives do?

Definition of preservative from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary: something that preserves or has the power of preserving; specifically: an additive used to protect against decay, discoloration, or spoilage

Preservatives have two main functions, kill microorganisms (microbicidal) and prevent their growth (microbistatic). Typically the microbicidal preservatives are the go to’s for cosmetic products, but with the push to natural in the personal care space, microbistatic agents are becoming more popular. While there’s lots of variation of effects based on which preservatives you choose, preservatives are all potential irritants. As a result, they should always be used at a minimum concentration necessary to effectively preserve the product, and always within their regulatory limits (sometimes different in different countries - look to yours for the best information on this. E.g., in Canada, look to Health Canada, the USA, the FDA, in Europe, the EU and COSing).

A few examples of things that may affect preservation

Ingredients: Some ingredients are more prone to contamination and should be routinely checked for this, for example, many colors, gums, clays, proteins, and ingredients with high water content. Making sure you have a good supplier and, again, testing your ingredients out, is a pretty key step for manufacturing products. Other things to be aware of include how you handle them, store them (e.g. does the ingredient need refrigeration?), expiry dates, etc.

Packaging: The packaging you use has a big impact on how you’ll have to preserve your product. For example, airless packaging with a product that never comes into contact with you or the environment will likely need less preservatives than a cream in a jar that you stick your fingers in to use.

Formulations: If you don’t have a stable product, that’s going to have a serious impact on how your preservatives are able to actually function. Different formulating decisions can also lower microbial contamination risks. For example, using low amounts of water, using humectants (e.g. glycerin) which are antimicrobial themselves, formulating at a high or low pH (bacteria and yeasts prefer pHs of roughly 5-8 -pHs of higher than 9 or less than 4 will prevent a lot of microbes from growing), high amounts salt or sugar (note, low amounts may have the opposite effect), essential oils, alcohol, etc. I’m not recommending relying on any of these methods to not use preservatives, but they do make your formulations a lot less prone to contamination... This thought process is at the stem of the whole ‘natural hurdle’ way of preserving products, but this topic is beyond the scope of this blog post.

Good Manufacturing Processes: Poor sanitation can open your products up to contamination. How you make your products also has a big impact - e.g. pasteurization (heating your hot phase ingredients over 71.6C followed by rapid cooling) is a good tool to use for products that need heating, batch size changes can impact how you need to preserve your products, the water you use (e.g. you should always be using purified water rather than tap water), etc.

Challenge Testing: Any time you formulate, especially if you’re planning to sell your products, you should probably be challenge testing to get a gauge of whether they’re safe and your preservative system is effective. This also helps to figure out the minimum amounts of preservatives that are needed to effectively preserve your products. I’m not going to go into any detail about this, as this topic would easily take up a full blog post. If you’re a new beauty manufacturer, I would highly recommend working with a lab to test your products.

Selecting your preservatives

Consideration 1, Broad Spectrum Activity

This is key to making a safe product. When you choose your preservatives, you want to make sure the preservative blend (note, you can buy pre-blended systems, which are WAY easier to use as a new formulator) should have bactericidal as well as fungicidal activity, covering the whole gamut, from gram-negative to positive.

Consideration 2, Compatibility with your Formulation

Preservatives, just like many other raw materials, are often stable in set ranges. For example, some may be stable at a pH of 4-6, some pH 3-12, some only under 30 degrees Celsius, some may not be compatible with different ingredient types (e.g. ionic vs cationically charged), and so on and so forth. Is it water or oil soluble? If you're making a product with mostly water, e.g. o/w emulsion with water as the continuous phase, you'll want to opt for water-soluble. When you're choosing your preservative, this is key! Not considering this for your product - you may end up with a pretty well unpreserved product...

Consideration 3, Does it fit into your ethos?

For example, are you keen to use only ‘natural’ (or nature identically more likely) or EcoCert options? If this is something you’re looking for in a preservative, you’ll want to look into this when choosing them. When evaluating ingredients, always ask your supplier for challenge testing information, INCI name (perhaps also the CAS number), and maybe even details on their natural status (e.g. via product data sheets).

Other considerations...

End product (e.g. water concentration, packaging, etc), where the product is going to be used (e.g. you probably don’t want to be using preservatives that are higher in the irritancy on sensitive skin types or even the face in general), regulations, and cost/availability.

Preservative Examples

There are many preservative options out there. To make things easier for you, I’ve compiled a list of easy to source preservatives available through Canadian suppliers with very low to no minimums. There are lots of other preservatives out there - to access some of the more innovative ones though, you may have to order directly through manufacturers (who have far higher minimums).

Potassium Sorbate: Effective against yeasts, molds and select bacteria. Note, should be combined with another preservative for broad-spectrum effects. INCI: Potassium Sorbate. Natural Status: Nature Identical. Recommended Usage: 0.1-0.5%. pH: up to 6. Add at 60 degrees Celcius or below. Note, final products may be light sensitive - use a package that protects your product from light. Available through Voyageur Soap and Candle.

Sodium Benzoate: Bacteriostatic and fungistatic, should be combined with another preservative. INCI: Sodium Benzoate. Natural Status: Nature Identical. Recommended Usage: under 1%. pH range: up to 6. Add at 60 degrees Celcius or below. Good idea not to mix with vitamin C - some food studies indicate this preservative may react with vitamin c to form small levels of Benzene, a known carcinogen. Available through Voyageur Soap and Candle, Saffire Blue.

Berthele, H., et al. (2014). Determination of the influence of factors (ethanol, pH and aw) on the preservation of cosmetics using experimental design. International journal of cosmetic science, 36(1), 54-61.

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/surfactants-basics2018-07-02T11:58:00-04:002019-01-17T20:25:26-05:00Surfactant Basics!Jen NovakovichThis post will give you a very brief overview of what surfactants are, why they’re used, what products they’re used in and other important details regarding their skin friendliness and more. Enjoy!

What are surfactants?

Surfactants are, from a more technical standpoint, ‘surface active agents’ ( hence their name); ultimately they’re able to reduce the surface tension of a solution. Now stepping away from jargon, surfactants are ingredients that allow you to blend otherwise incompatible ingredients (e.g. fat-soluble and water-soluble), and to create a cleansing and foaming effect in your product. The reason for this comes down to their structure largely. Surfactants look a lot like sperm, they have a water-soluble (polar) head and a fat-soluble tail. This basic structure allows for a lot of its’ functions.

Now say you had a beaker of water with or without a bit of oil in it. With just a bit of surfactant in the beaker, you would end up with them clustering to the top of the solution, with their heads (water-loving) facing down and their tails up.

When you have enough surfactant in your solution, they begin to move downwards into the water phase to create micelles - a fundamental component of any surfactant-based product. Micelles form little balls, the tails all facing inwards, often trapping a bit of the once surface oil in between, as is the case in lotions. When you have enough micelles in the solution, water-based lotions/emulsions now become possible. Here’s where we arrive at the Critical Micelle Concentration; you’ve finally introduced enough surfactant to end up with enough micelles to create a stable emulsion product.

Below is what a micelle looks like, with the head of the surfactant facing outwards and the tail inwards, trapping oil in the ball.

Enough of these bad boys will create your stable and effective products, granted they are compatibly charged. For example, when you use negatively charged surfactants, you want to use only surfactants with that negative charge (or no charge) so that they’re able to sufficiently repel each other. In contrast, if you had negative and positive surfactants in a mixture together, since they wouldn’t repel each other in the same way, the micelles would tend to clump together, resulting in a not so functional end product. Instead, when you use only the negative surfactants, the micelles are able to stay dispersed throughout the formula, ultimately forming an emulsion, for example (emulsions/water-based lotions are really just a whole bunch of microscopic micelles containing oil, sitting in a water continuous phase).

There are a number of things that impact the way micelles act (e.g. HLB values, charge, surfactant type) - in the case of a surfactant with a cleansing ability, the picture below is a great diagram of how micelles help make that happen. In contrast, emulsifying surfactants don't have the same cleansing capacity and usually stick to your skin (e.g. lotions, creams, liquid makeup).

That’s a basic overview of what surfactants are, there are also many different types of surfactants out there, all with their own unique effects for your products. The first thing to look at for surfactants is their charge, which has a huge impact on how you should use them and which products they’ll be compatible with.

Classes of surfactants based on charge

Cationic: Positively charged surfactants, typically used for hair conditioner products. Note, these surfactants WILL NOT play well with anionic surfactants as mentioned above. Examples: quaternary ammonium compounds (e.g. cetrimonium chloride)

Anionic: Negatively charged surfactants, commonly used in emulsions and wash off products. These surfactants, because of their charge, are very good at cleansing the skin - if used alone, the products would be quite harsh to the skin. As a result, when these are used, they’re usually blended with an Amphoteric and Non-Ionic Surfactant for best results. Note, these surfactants WILL NOT play well with anionic surfactants as mentioned above. Examples: alkyl sulfates ( e.g. sodium lauryl sulfates), alkyl ether sulfates (Sodium Laureth Sulfates), sulfosuccinates (e.g. disodium lauryl sulfosuccinate), fatty acid isethionates (e.g. sodium cocoyl isethionate), fatty acid taurides (e.g. sodium methyl cocoyl taurate), acyl sarcosinates (e.g. sodium lauroryl sarcosinate) and carboxylate salts (soap ~natural option).

Amphoteric: Surfactants that can be either negatively or positively charged. Added with both cationic or anionic surfactants for more skin friendly products. Examples: alkyl betaines (e.g. cocamidopropyl betaine), alkyl sultaines (e.g. cocamidoproyl hydroxysultaine)

Non-Ionic: Uncharged surfactants, added to either cationic or anionic surfactants for more skin friendly products. Rarely used on their own in conventional cosmetic products, but, since these surfactant types have more ‘natural’ options, many indie beauty manufacturers will use them without charged surfactants. Examples: alkoxylates alcohols (e.g. oleth 5), ethoxylated oils/fatty acids/glycol esters/sorbitan (e.g. PEGs), alkyl polyglycosides (e.g. decyl glucoside)

I just have a few notes to add about the differently charged surfactants. Because of the fact that most readily available charged surfactants aren’t ‘natural’, all-natural formulas with surfactants are quite the challenge. For example, the amphoteric surfactant Cocamidopropyl betaine is naturally derived, but it also has some synthetic parts to it. This is all fine and well… until manufacturers are not truthful on their labels by calling their products all-natural, perpetuating a lot of undue misinformation. This ingredient can be found in a large percentage of ‘all-natural’ shampoos. Again, I’m not saying the ingredient is bad, it’s the marketing that bothers me. I find most ‘all-natural’ cleansing products on the market are either not all-natural, or are often not skin friendly. This isn’t always the case, but in my consultation work, overwhelmingly this is very common.

Note, you can hardly see it, but this product has a 100% natural claim on the bottle..............

Saponified oils (i.e. oils reacted with sodium/potassium hydroxide, e.g. liquid castile soap or cold-process soap, indicated by sodium/potassium -ate… e.g. sodium cocoate by INCI, or otherwise known as saponified coconut oil) are one of the few ‘natural’ options for anionic surfactants readily available, but there are a few problems when using these surfactant types when making products intended for your face or hair. These natural surfactants are only stable at very high pHs close to 8 or 9. In contrast, the pH of our skin and hair is closer to 5.2-5.4. Because products with these surfactant types cannot be pH adjusted (the product will lose stability at around pH 7), they can be quite unfriendly to the skin barrier and to your hair cuticle… e.g, in hair, a higher pH can cause the hair to swell and cuticle to open, making it very prone to damage. Many surfactants, including these, also react with metals in the water (that’s where chelating agents can come in). As a result, if you’re in an area with harder water, soap scum will become a problem. I see a lot of confusion for products especially among ‘shampoo bars’. A good shampoo bar will be pH adjusted to your scalp and use ingredients that don’t cause soap scum. Shampoo bars are not soaps, instead, they are syndet bars; they use a blend of dry surfactants to create a solid product. Instead of saponified oils, they’ll opt for different surfactants that allow for a skin friendly product. Most commonly, SLS will be used because it’s cheap and effective, but it can be a bit harsh depending on how it’s used. Shampoo bars don’t need this surfactant type, there are many other dry surfactant types available, although the manufacturer may need to go directly to ingredient manufacturers. There’s a trend in my own community for soap shampoo bars by some of the local makers…. These aren’t really going to be a nice shampoo bar… I love the idea of eliminating packaging waste by creating solid products… but this trend might cause consumers to think all shampoo bars cause residue and make their hair feel gross…. At the end of the day, there are many ways you can create a great natural surfactant-based product, you just need to be a good formulator with access to some of the more innovative ingredients that you often can only find directly through ingredient manufacturers (rather than suppliers). Note, these challenges are one of the reasons why I personally love natural formulating :). That's my two cents, let's move on!

Classes of surfactants based on function

You can also classify surfactants based on how they act in formula or the products they’re capable of producing.

Surfactants: All of these classes are surfactants, but in the cosmetic industry, ‘surfactants’ are surfactants capable of detergency or foam. Surfactants are used in cleansing products, like soap, cleansers, shampoos, etc.

Emulsifiers: These surfactants will react in a way to create an emulsion, e.g. a cream or a lotion. Emulsifiers are found in lotions and creams, conditioners, liquid to solid makeup, and cream cleansers.

Solubilizers: Ingredients like essential oils don’t mix with water-soluble ingredients naturally. For example, they would just sit at the surface of a product undiluted, which is not a good thing for a product. Solubilizers make it possible for them to solubilize throughout their formula, ultimately diluting them for a safe end-product.

Note: Surfactants are used in varying percentages for different product types, for example, at around 10% total in face wash and upwards to 20% in a shower gel. Different areas of our body are, for example, more sensitive than the others. A good formulator will tailor the different products they make based on these differences. For the best end-product, you typically want a blend of different surfactants. For example, when you use anionic surfactants, you'll usually also use a bit of amphoteric and non-ionic to give you a nice, skin friendly end product.

For more information on surfactants, listen to my podcast on surfactant science with Perry Romanowski, internationally renowned cosmetic chemist and founder at Chemists Corner.

I think that’s a good basic review of surfactants. There’s so much more to dive into, but I think the information I presented will give you a good starting point to start to really understand the different surfactants out there, why they’re used, and how they impact products. That’s a wrap! Questions, queries, conundrums or concerns? Leave em’ below or on any of our social media channels!

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/fragrancing-series-part-2-layering-and-fragrance-families2018-06-13T11:15:00-04:002018-06-20T14:38:50-04:00Fragrancing Series Part 2: Layering and Fragrance FamiliesJen NovakovichThis post is part two of our fragrancing series, if you read through all of them you’ll have a good basic base to start making well thought out perfumes :). In part one, we covered some of the history in the perfume industry. If you haven’t read it and are interested in a mini history lesson, you can check that one out here. This post is all about layering in perfume and fragrance families, which is a key topic to learn about if you want to perfume. This post is a very basic review to get you started, enjoy!

Layering your perfume

When we make perfume, this is generally a good thing to think about to make a nice balanced blend with good depth and longevity. This is especially important when working with synthetics as they are a lot simpler by nature compared to essential oils, which are an accord in themselves, each made up of their own top, middle and often, base notes.

Accord: a blend of many constituents to make up a certain smell. For example, strawberry is a blend of synthetic constituents to give you a smell that persuades you to think of that berry (i.e. strawberry accord). Since essential oils are themselves made up of many constituents to give you their distinct smell, these can be thought of as an accord.

Below are some basics about each note in a perfume:

Top note: Initial impression (citrus, greens & fruity smells). These notes are from more volatile smaller constituents in a fragrance. For example, citruses, which are primarily made up of very small carbon chains (monoterpenes), and evaporate very quickly in contrast to the heavier middle and base note constituents.

Middle note: After you smell the top, as it dissipates (1-5 minutes), the heart emerges (Florals, herbs & spices). Middle notes help round out a perfume and are less volatile than the top notes.

Base note: Lingering trail of the fragrance, the scent that people remember (musk, wood, vanilla, patchouli & resins). Base notes help to ground the perfume due to the heavier, longer carbon chain constituents. In natural perfumery, I suggest always having a base note to enhance the longevity of your perfume throughout the day. Ever use a perfume that doesn't smell after an hour? This is a common issue with natural perfumes, especially when they’re made up of mostly the more volatile top and middle notes.

How much of each note should I add? Ultimately this is up to you. In natural perfumes, I personally like to do about 30:30:40 (base notes) because I find the longevity of the blend is better, but there are a lot of people who prefer more top or middle heavy perfumes.

With layering in mind, the families in fragrances are a good next thing to think about as they will all fall into the different notes, again depending on their volatility predominantly. In addition, ‘storytelling’ through fragrancing is often a key component of perfumery - for example capturing that feeling of your wedding night, of a driven entrepreneur, or of your grandma's baking. I’m oversimplifying here, but using the families below and some of their descriptive verbiages can be a good place to start when trying to capture a certain feeling or whatever else.

How we choose a fragrance: Familiarity breeds likability. For example, Play-Doh contains vanilla (meant to conjure happiness and comfort). As adults, we’re immediately drawn to fragrances with vanilla, and as a result, many fragrances today are made with vanilla. Perfumers start with inspirations, like a childhood memory, and build scents to capture it. This is the modern approach to perfumery, i.e. storytelling (emotional, timeless and easier to remember).

Note, as you may have gathered from the above fragrance families, your palate and ultimately potential fragrance outcomes are very limited with natural aromas (essential oils, absolutes & CO2 extracts). There’s also A LOT more challenge with regards to keeping a consistent smell in natural perfumery. For example, essential oils smell different depending on the environmental stresses on the plants, including the season, the elevation, the time of day, and so on and so forth. Constituents in essential oils will change to help the plant thrive in its environment… these constituents are also responsible for the unique smell of the plant. In addition, how the plant is distilled or pressed will be a huge contributor to the constituents that are left in the final essential oil. For example, if it’s done at a higher temperature, more fragile constituents will likely not survive the process. Unless you're planning on getting the essential oil from the same producer and only from plants that were cultivated in a certain manner at a certain time of the year, the smells will vary from batch to batch. Note, even with these careful considerations, seasons will also vary each year… There’s a lot more consistency when it comes to using synthetics. While natural perfumery is a heck of a lot harder to make a nice end fragrance, that’s also one of the reasons I personally love it.

Below are some basic compatibilities with respect to aroma types. These can be a good guide but they are by no means definitive. There are lots of exceptions to these suggestions. In addition, some of the most sought-after perfumes today are being made by perfumers that are breaking the rules and creating truly unique blends.

Floral: floral, fruity, green, woody, earthy

Fruity: Floral, fruity, green, earthy

Green: suitable with all types in small amounts

Herbaceous: Green, herbaceous, camphorous, woody, earthy

Camphorous: green, herbaceous, camphorous, spicy, woody, earthy

Spicy: use small amounts with care

Woody: floral, green, herbaceous, camphorous, spicy, woody, earthy

Earthy: suitable in most blends up to about 10%

There’s so much more to dive into about layering and fragrance families but I think this blog post covered most of the key basics. If you’d like to learn more, come on out to one of our perfumery seminars :). In our next perfumery post, we’ll cover how to actually make a perfume. Stay tuned! Questions, queries, conundrums or concerns? Leave them on one of our social media pages or contact us at info@theecowell.com

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/skin2018-05-19T13:46:00-04:002019-01-17T20:06:54-05:00Do your cosmetic products penetrate the skin?Jen Novakovich
Have you heard that 60 to even 90% of cosmetic ingredients are able to penetrate your skin into your body? Upon reading about this concern from other beauty brands and from some of our followers, I just wanted to write a quick blog post to take you through this topic. In this post, I’ll take you through the biology of your skin, how it protects you from the environment around you, how and which substances can penetrate through the skin and why, regulations in cosmetics, why the above percentages aren’t based in reality, important things to know about your cosmetics, and lots more. Enjoy!

Skin, what’s it really good for?

At the end of the day, the skin on your body provides you with a relatively tough, sac of sorts to surround and protect your delicate insides from the harsh environment around you. Protection is its main function, and it does this in a number of different ways. For example, the natural pH of your skin is roughly 5.5; this, as well as sebum, helps to control the number and growth of the bacteria that flourish here. Melanin, a chemical secreted from your skin, helps to protect your skin from UV rays. Aside from this ‘chemical’ protection, the skin itself acts as a physical barrier. The layers of hard, keratinized cells prevent things from easily penetrating down into your body. The skin also has a number of immune cells, like Langerhans’ cells for example, which are present in the top layers of your skin, at the epidermis. The skin helps to regulate temperature, has metabolic processes that are important for our overall health, for example creating Vitamin D from sunlight, helps to excrete waste from the body through sweat, and so much more.

The biology of your skin tells you a lot about how you should be treating it, including what types of cosmetics you should be using and why they may work. It also tells you a lot about what may penetrate into your skin and why, but more on that later. Here’s a quick diagram that we made to give you a good overview of the basic biology of your skin.

I know the above infographic is a wee bit sciency. To make things easier to understand, we also made this quick video to take you through all of the information above!

If you’d like even more detail about the biology of your skin, you can listen to the below interview with Dr. Katerina Steventon from our podcast. In this episode, we took a deep dive into the biology of your skin.

Absorbance into the skin

With all of that in mind, when you take a look at the structure of your skin, you can get a good idea of how and why certain ingredients may or may not penetrate into your body.

The top layer of your epidermis is a structure like bricks and mortar. Your skin cells are tightly packed into the fatty intercellular mortar.

For chemicals (note, everything's a chemical :) to pass through the stratum corneum (the top layer of your skin), they either have to pass through the skin cells or around them (i.e. through the fatty mortar). To give you some context, below are the size of a few relevant items.

Stratum Corneum ‘Hydrophilic’ Paths: 0.4nm

Note, ‘hydrophilic’ (e.g. water soluble) paths would be MUCH smaller.

Cell Membrane: 6-10nm

Stratum Corneum Lipid Bilayer:13nm

Stratum Corneum Intercorneocyte space: 20-75nm

Stratum Corneum Thickness: 10,000-40,000nm

Diameter of your Hair: 80,000nm

As you may be able to see from these sizes, water-soluble substances need to be VERY small to make it through the stratum corneum. Fat-soluble chemicals can travel through the lipid bilayers when small… but comparatively speaking, they still have huge distances to travel to make it to just the deeper layers of your epidermis, let alone to your dermis or to your bloodstream. Because of the complexity of your skin and all the different layers, for substances to potentially make it down to the deeper layers of your skin, they’d have to be smaller than 1000 daltons if they’re in an amphiphilic base (e.g. an emulsion that contains both hydrophilic (water) and hydrophobic (oil) phases as well as the amphiphilic substance (emulsifier), e.g. lotion). Even still, they’ve got a comparatively ginormous distance to travel after that to make it to just the dermis. In addition, the substances would be challenged by the changes in for example pH, polarity, solubility, your immune cells, etc. as they move to the deeper layers of your skin. As a result, most cosmetic products have extremely limited penetration and sit mostly on the surface of the skin.

Cosmetic products may…

Sit on the top of the skin and potentially penetrate a wee bit to the stratum corneum (the outer layer of your skin). This provides moisture to your skin and helps to reduce water loss, helping to improve the appearance of your skin overall. With color cosmetics, the products will temporarily stain the top layers of your skin.

Penetrate past the top layer of your skin to the middle part of your epidermis (stratum granulosum). For example, humectants can do this. When they do, they will attract water from the environment and deeper layers of the skin to give you more supple looking skin. As a result, active ingredients are often paired with humectants (e.g. glycerin, butylene glycol) to pull them to the stratum granulosum.

Penetrate to the deeper layers of your epidermis (stratum basale). For example, certain cosmeceutical substances like peptides, which may stimulate skin changes, for example with collagen synthesis (note, if they’re able to have this type of deep penetration and skin effects, the products will often be regulated as a drug by law in North America, unless they don’t claim the effects on the label…). These changes are transient, i.e. once you stop using the product, the changes will go away quickly. To achieve this level of penetration, the active ingredients are often put in an emulsion base combined with a humectant and/or some sort of delivery agent.

Very few cosmetic ingredients will penetrate to the dermis, and even when they do, they’ll often be acted on by macrophages to remove them before they enter the bloodstream. This is different than pharmaceuticals (e.g. steroids) or injected cosmetic substances (e.g. sodium hyaluronate)... but this discussion is about cosmetics. If a cosmetic product has that sort of penetration, it must be regulated as a drug here in North America, which have way more regulatory and safety requirements for this reason.

Note, cosmetic ingredients are regulated by their size, as well as a lot of other things. Ingredients that are small enough to penetrate into your bloodstream are generally not allowed in cosmetic products.

Note, we’re talking about skin that’s intact. Cosmetic products aren’t generally meant for broken skin (that’s where the cosmetics regulated as drugs come in). Obviously, when cosmetic products are applied to broken skin, a lot more of its ingredients have the opportunity to penetrate.

Final thoughts

There’s A LOT going on here to get the full gist of the skin and absorption of ingredients in a single blog post. Considering that certain cosmetic ingredients are frequently found in our urine or blood, clearly, some ingredients used in cosmetic products may be able to penetrate… but 60-90%, I think not. If ingredients are able to penetrate, it will be in very very very small proportions. Because of all of the complexity as noted above, there won’t be a set percentage that anyone will be able to truthfully give you about the ingredients in your cosmetics and their absorption into the body. I think we should be thinking about the ingredients in our cosmetic products, but for people working in the cosmetic industry, we should also be making accurate claims and trying to maybe stray away from fear mongering, especially when it’s not based on good evidence and only on pseudoscience… That’s my two cents and that’s a wrap. Questions, queries, conundrums or concerns? Give us a shout on social media or reach out to us at info@theecowell.com. Thanks for reading!

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/the-eco-market2018-05-10T12:17:00-04:002018-07-01T09:13:42-04:00The Eco MarketJen Novakovich
A big heartfelt thank you to everyone who came out to The Eco Market yesterday! THANK YOU for making our first event a huge success! Thank you to all of our outstanding vendors who took a risk and joined our show in its first year of running. Thank you to the speakers that traveled from throughout Ontario to give presentations in the theatre. The goal of our event was to support local green businesses and innovation and to have a more meaningful conversation with our community about working together for a more sustainable future. We’re so pleased with how our show turned out, and so grateful for all of the support we’ve received throughout our community. We’re especially grateful to our volunteers who were doing an AWESOME job all throughout the day and leading up! We absolutely could not have done this show without your help!! An extra big thank you to our volunteer coordinators Jen L and Allison Purdy - these gals have dedicated so much time, energy, creativity, and love to our event. This event was run by the very tiny 2 person business The Eco Well - we absolutely couldn’t have done this without you two.

Jen from The Eco Well had the idea, about this time last year, to launch this show. From her own experiences running a green social enterprise, she realized that our region could be doing a lot more to elevate these types of business. We have a flourishing community of green enterprises right here in the Kitchener Waterloo region - she wanted to let our whole community know about them. This event wasn’t for profit, was run on a very tiny budget from a very small business, and was operated via volunteers on all sides, including The Eco Well. To anyone who purchased anything at The Eco Market or The Eco Well tables, your support will help make The Eco Market a sustainable and annual event for the KW region. This was a big learning curve for us and there are a lot of things we’ll do even better next year, especially figuring out parking. Thank you for your patience with us there. Honestly, we were only expecting a couple hundred people to come through the doors… we were blown away to have a huge line up before the show even opened and over 600 people through the doors in the first hour!!

Here's a video we made to sum up the day! Much love!

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/color-cosmetics-101-video2018-04-28T13:26:00-04:002018-04-28T13:28:33-04:00Color Cosmetics 101: VideoJen NovakovichCheck out our latest Youtube Video: A Brief Guide to Colour Cosmetics . In this episode, we cover history, some of the basics and some of the nitty gritties surrounding the world of colour cosmetics. Enjoy!

When your purchasing your products, are you on the lookout for products that are all-natural? Well, did you know that the term ‘natural’ is one of the most often misrepresented words on a label in cosmetics? I think that this confusion is largely stemming from the fact that there isn’t a legal definition of the word, allowing for creative interpretation on the manufacturer side of things. What is ‘natural’ anyway? Upon discussions with other formulators, there’s a lot of general confusion about what the word means. There is a definition though, and I think using accurate ones, whether or not they’re currently well regulated (spoiler-alert, ‘natural’ isn’t!), is extremely important for manufacturer transparency. As a formulator, even if you just don’t know, when you put these things on your labels, you’re ultimately lying to your customers. In this blog post, I’ll lay out some basic definitions and run through all the different shades of natural, from unadulterated products that pretty much come straight from the ground, all the way to fully synthetic products that still bear the natural moniker. Whether your manufacturing cosmetics or looking for that all-natural product, if you care about the topic, this blog post will hopefully be helpful to you :).

What is ‘Natural’?

As logic has probably already told you, natural ingredients are ones that come from nature. For an ingredient to be all-natural, all of its components should be natural. To get the ingredient to a workable state, some processing will be required in order to refine it, which is important to remove impurities that can be quite harsh on your skin at times. The processing of the ingredients that would be acceptable here is physical processing, processing in a way that doesn’t use synthetic chemicals to extract the ingredients. Common methods include blending, maceration, roasting, drying, grinding, steam distillation and cold pressing. Common examples of natural ingredients include essential oils, non-volatile plant oils (i.e. carrier oils), plant butters like Shea Butter or Cocoa Butter, natural waxes, like carnauba or candelilla waxes, lanolin, jojoba oil, or beeswax, certain clays, baking soda, etc. The 100% natural claim that many manufacturers use is quite tricky though because there are only a very small number of product types that you can make with all-natural ingredients. Moreover, to extend the shelf life of the natural products, sometimes not so all-natural ingredients are required.

Here are a few examples of products that would be a-okay to call themselves all-natural.

Moving on from completely natural ingredients, we arrive at the ingredients that are “derived from nature” but have been changed with some sort of synthetic processing. The advantages of using these ingredients are that you can seriously open up the possibilities of products you can make. For example, products like soaps, shampoos, conditioners, and water-based moisturizers now become possible, which wouldn’t have otherwise been with all-natural ingredients alone. Derived from nature ingredients can be split up into two groups: derived via minimal processing or derived via synthetic processing.

Naturally Derived with Minimal Processing: These ingredients have been processed with a few approved chemical processing methods but ultimately don’t contain any synthetic chemicals in the end product. On a label, the correct way to talk about these ingredients would be ‘derived from natural sources’ not ‘all-natural’ or ‘100% natural’. Some processing methods here include alkylation, condensation, hydrolysis, hydrogenation, esterification and/or transesterification, fermentation, oxidation/reduction, neutralization, sulphation and saponification. Popular examples of ingredients that are naturally derived with minimal processing include guar and xanthan gum (fermentation), vegetable glycerin (usually via saponification), decyl glucoside (from coconut fatty acids and corn starch), and sorbitan olivate (from olive fatty acids and sorbitan polyalcohols).

Here are a few examples of products made with naturally derived with minimal processing ingredients. This is personally our preferred ballpark of ingredients to work with - lot’s you can do for the products to make them more effective and you can confidently still call your product natural :).

Naturally Derived with Synthetic Processing: These ingredients are quite common and very frequently misrepresented as natural when in fact they contain synthetic ingredient components in the end molecule. It’s important to know that some ingredients can be derived from both minimal or synthetic processing, as a manufacturer, checking with your supplier is key and looking to the Certificate of Analysis and flow charts for the ingredient. For consumers, it’s hard to know from an ingredient list but if it’s important to you this would be something to ask the manufacturer. Common processing methods here include alkoxylation, sulphonation, ethoxylation, methylation and propoxylation. Common examples in ingredients include sodium laureth sulfate, PEG (polyethylene glycol) oils (makes the oils more water soluble), cocamidopropyl betaine (a popular surfactant), and isopropyl myristate (a popular emollient).

This is one of my favorite natural shampoos to use myself, which uses some of the naturally derived with synthetically processed naturally derived ingredients mentioned above. There are a lot of pros to using these ingredient types when it comes to the effectiveness of the product.

When making claims about natural, the above ingredients are where I would limit phrases like, ‘natural cosmetics’ or ‘from nature’. Below are ingredients that are not natural. Before I dive in, I just want to point out that there are many advantages and disadvantages to using natural as well as synthetic ingredient types. Natural ingredients are renewable, they can contain blends of very beneficial constituents, they can have a good social impact for especially smallholder farmers when done right, etc. With that said, it’s a common misnomer to say that all-natural ingredients are always more eco-friendly or better for your skin. Many natural ingredients, especially used in higher amounts for a product, can actually be very allergenic, an example is essential oils, which are among some of the most allergenic ingredients in the cosmetic industry. Keeping with this example, you can easily argue that certain essential oils will never be sustainable and certain synthetic fragrances may be a better option environmentally. For example, in the case of rose oil, which takes about 1000lbs of plant material to extract a single pound of essential oil, or sandalwood, which has a glacial regrowth period. I know that there are a few ‘sustainable’ sandalwood plantations that are cropping up, but I remain very skeptical.

As defined by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary

Non-Renewable: Not able to be replaced orreplenishedonce used.

Renewable: Capable of being renewed (re-grown) once used.

With synthetic ingredients, the drawbacks include that they’re derived typically from non-renewable resources and thus generally wouldn’t be considered sustainable. Historically, there have also been many synthetic ingredients with some undesirable health effects… but today, there’s a lot of misplaced fear-mongering about the health effects of these ingredients, when in reality, often times there’s very little to no reliable peer-reviewed scientific evidence to back up the concerns. With respect to the non-renewable inputs, over the next 20 years, many synthetic ingredients will be developed instead via green technology (already happening today), at which point, these could be very sustainable options. For products, synthetic ingredients are more versatile, cheaper and often purer, but I’ll get to that below. At the end of the day, I just want to emphasize the point that there are pros and cons to both synthetic and natural ingredients, and it’s not so cut and dry. I would personally suggest that you stay very critical to the fear mongering you see on social media or google for both natural and synthetic ingredients… fact checking in PubMed is always my go-to recommendation (and look for human studies and replicated results through a number of sources :), although I know that’s easier said than done. That’s my two cents, let’s move on!

What are Nature Identical ingredients?

Ultimately these are synthetic ingredients that are identical to their natural counterparts. These are VERY commonly represented as natural, but they are in fact entirely synthetic. The reasons for these ingredients are typically to prevent harmful impurities, like toxic levels of heavy metals in the case of iron oxides, or to make the ingredients more cost-effective and less environmentally intensive, e.g. in the case of nature identical rose oil. Common nature identical ingredients include amino acids, vitamin A, B5 and certain forms of vitamin E (indicated by the dl- prefix), iron oxides, zinc oxides, potassium sorbate, sorbic acid, sodium benzoate, etc. I just want to re-emphasize that these ingredients aren't necessarily 'bad' and there are good reasons for them to be around. At the end of the day, I do think it's important for manufacturers to be honest with their marketing.

Here's another product with some of the nature identical ingredients I mentioned as well as some synthetically derived natural ingredients. Not so sure about the all-natural claim on the front of their package...

What is a Synthetic ingredient?

These are ingredients that are entirely made from synthetic chemicals or petroleum derivatives. Note, petroleum is a good base here because of its high carbon content and versatility to be manipulated. Chemically, petroleum is a natural product since it does come from the ground, but today, we define synthetics to include them because they are non-renewable. These are generally much cheaper and easier to produce a pure end product compared to a natural alternative, which often has to be refined in some way. Common examples include carbomer, microcrystalline wax, and mineral oil.

There are lot’s of advantages to using synthetic ingredients, especially for hair care, for example in the case of silicones, which leave your hair shiny, soft and smooth. Whether or not using synthetic ingredients fits in your own ethos as a consumer or manufacturer is totally up to you, but as a manufacturer, it’s good to just be honest about the ingredients your using. I have no qualms with the marketing by L’oreal, who unapologetically uses many synthetic ingredient types in their professional haircare product line.

The word “natural” is one thing, but once you start marketing as “100% all natural” all of the ingredients in your product should be natural.

Misrepresenting ‘natural’ on a label may be one of my biggest pet peeves for manufacturers, especially when they use claims like ‘all-natural’ or ‘100% natural’. The word “natural” is one thing, but once you start marketing as “100% all natural” all of the ingredients in your product should be natural. Again, using naturally derived, nature identical or even synthetic ingredients can be fine just fine, but it is up to the manufacturer to know what these ingredient types are and make accurate claims in their marketing. Ultimately, you can choose whether or not you want to include synthetics in your beauty routine or products your formulating, but if you don’t want to include them, knowing the above shades of natural is key to helping you make better purchasing or formulating decisions. Do you see a manufacturer making an inaccurate 100% natural claim? I would personally reach out to them to ask why they chose to use the claim when they are using synthetic ingredients, but hey, I think this confused claim bothers me more than most, But let me know what you think. That’s all for now!! Any questions, queries, conundrums or concerns? Leave them below or on any of our social media feeds!

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/fragrancing-part-1-perfumery-through-the-ages2018-03-19T10:32:00-04:002018-03-19T10:35:11-04:00Fragrancing Part 1: Perfumery through the Ages!Jen Novakovich

I am a bit of a perfumery enthusiast, but unfortunately, probably partly because of the secretiveness of the perfume industry, it's pretty hard to find good information about perfumery. Over a 5 part series, I'm going to try to take care of some of that! In this blog post, I'll take you through the history of perfumery, which I think is super fascinating! In subsequent posts, I'll cover fragrance families and accords, different aromatic chemicals - including natural ones, 'layering' in perfumery, and a basic run through natural perfumery. Enjoy! :)

A Very Quick History of Perfume: From Ancient Times to Today

As you can imagine, there's a lot more to the history of perfumery, as it's an art that really developed alongside different cultures. I think this is a good place to start to get a little bit of an appreciation about just how important fragrancing was throughout human civilization. If you're interested in diving even deeper into the history of perfume, you'll have a better idea of what to search to learn even more. Here's a very brief overview of the history of perfumery!

Ancient Historyperfumes were present in even some of the earliest human civilizations, which we can observe through ancient texts. It's thought that perfumery really had its start in ancient Egypt. At this time, fragrance was worn as an offering to the gods, worn by the nobility to be closer to them. Scented ointments where also believed to have medicinal effects. Ancient Egyptian kings and queens were in fact bathed and massaged with essential oils throughout their lives, and once dead, were also preserved with them during mummification.

Source: Ca Fleure Bon

Middle Ages During this time, the plague and other diseases were rampant throughout Europe and people thought these diseases were spread through the smell - the air was blamed for many diseases, including malaria, which's name itself means 'bad air' (mal'aria). It was believed that pleasant scents could help prevent disease. Nobility wore fragrance balls filled with amber, myrrh & other aromatic herbs to protect themselves. At the same time, monasteries became keepers of aromatic blends for wellness; this was the foundation for aromatherapy.

Source: Dionea Orcini Jewellery

Renaissance Queens and noblemen fought for formulations by the first Italian chemists, perfumers started to establish shops in Paris, offering gloves scented with aromatic oils. Olfactive preferences associated with different glove makers emerged.

Source: Fragrantica

Classical Era (1600s-1700s) Due to risks, bathing became less frequent. People used excessive fragrance to scent themselves1700s France became the centre of world perfumery. In the court of Versailles, it was mandatory to wear a different fragrance every day. A citrusy blend of oils was developed by an Italian perfumer, capturing the smell of an Italian morning. He named the blend after his new hometown, Cologne, Germany, and launched the first Eau De Cologne.

1860-1900 First synthetic fragrance was unveiled, giving way to modern perfumery, which was increasingly seen as an art form. Note, we'll explore both synthetic and natural aromatic chemicals in quite a bit of detail in future blog posts! :)1920s perfume was a product of luxury. During this time, women started to work, play and smoke. For both fashion and perfume, shocking excess was a popular theme. Perfumer Francois Coty teamed with jewler Renee Lalique to create attractive bottles. Gabrielle Coco Chanel launched perfume no.5 with more synthetic notes than natural, with a modern ‘champaign-like’ sparkle. Still a bestseller today. This perfume was characterized by Aldehyde notes.

WW2 Old Spice became standard issue for soldier kits. After the war, as a celebration of the end of the restrictive war years, Christian Dior launched 'character' fragrances. Fragrances became lighter and more feminine.

The 1950s fragrance became accessible to the masses as it was launched into department stores; this charge was led ‘by Estee Lauder’s Youth Dew in 1953. Old Spice was also launched into drug stores.

Parfum: Through Smoke. Latin roots, first used in 1533.

The 1960s saw the ‘green movement’ with more fragrances inspired with green notes.The 1970s the ‘make love not war’ movement had a strong impact on the fragrance industry. Here, there was an increase in popularity of musks and patchouli as well as grassy notes. With the defined new roles of women in the working world, there was a push with perfumery to ‘reclaim individuality’. The perfume Charlie targeted young working women. At this time, more men were also using perfume - Polo for men was launched.

The 1990s Giorgio Beverly Hills offered fragrance strips in magazines. In the 90s, instead of the excessive aroma before, popular notes where flowers, water, leaves and citrusy accords. Lancome Tresor helped shift the classic scents for working women to more feminine floral aromas. Calvin Klein introduced a unisex scent, CK1, which had a much lighter citrusy profile. Perfumes of the 90s were more reminiscent of childhood and more aligned with taste (e.g. vanilla, toffee, praline).

The 2000s styles focused on the ‘return of the entrepreneur’. The perfumery market leaned towards a more vintage concept, e.g. Coco Mademoiselle, which was modernized with floral and fruity touches. There was an increase in celebrity fragrances as social media grew. There was also a renewed interest in custom scents, which are today a new niche market (e.g. Tom Ford), even more popular in 2018!

Perfumery evolved throughout history, first used as an offering to the gods, eventually becoming a tool to define self-expression and showcase the advancement of technology and change of our culture.

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/video-skin-microflora-basics-part-12018-03-12T08:06:00-04:002018-04-28T13:30:44-04:00Video: Skin Microflora Basics, part 1Jen Novakovich
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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/essential-oils2018-03-03T08:39:00-05:002018-03-03T08:40:53-05:00A Crash Course in Essential Oil Safety, Sustainability and Usage.Jen NovakovichThis article was originally written for The Holistic Parent Magazine. Click here to learn more about them!

Imagine walking through a thicket of mint, you’d smell the aroma emanating from the mint. If you pick up a mint leaf and crunch it with your fingertips, you would notice some oil being released from the plant and a burst of aroma. Now, say you put the leaf under the lens of a strong microscope. You would notice fat globules interspersed throughout the matrix of the plant. That’s the essential oil. Quite simply, essential oils are the aromatic volatile components of aromatic plants. In nature, they serve as a defence against pests, a means for communication between plants, and a tool to attract pollinators. For us, they’ve been used for thousands of years for fragrancing, medicinal benefits, food flavouring and more. Today, aside from being a hot topic in scientific research, essential oils have become incredibly popular for skincare and aromatherapy. Unfortunately, topics like safety and efficacy seem to have fallen by the wayside in favour of public fervour. This article will explore what you need to know before using essential oils specifically in skincare, and how to use them effectively.

The process of making essential oils tells a lot about their characteristics. It takes anywhere from hundreds to thousands of pounds of a given plant material to extract a single pound of its essential oil. For example, it can take around 50-60 lbs of Eucalyptus, 200-250 lbs of Lavender and 10,000 lbs of Rose Blossoms, to make a single pound of their essential oils. This plant material is most often steam distilled or cold pressed (in citrus fruit). During steam distillation, steam is used to break apart the plant matrix to release the essential oils, which rises up through connecting pipes before it’s forced into a condenser where the vapour is cooled back into a liquid. At the end of this process, you end up with a vat of liquid, with the essential oil sitting on top of the floral waters, where it can be syphoned off.

It’s a common misnomer to equate natural as safe at whatever dosage and even to equate essential oils as natural. They may be naturally derived, but we certainly don’t have them in such potent concentrations in nature. As a result, improper use can result in burns, blisters, sensitization and even toxicity. Taking a look at the end product of steam distillation, clearly essential oils don’t mix with water or water-soluble ingredients. Remember the whole “like dissolves like” idea from science class? Well, this applies to essential oils. If you want to dilute them, which you should anytime you’re applying them to the skin, dilute them in an oil.

The usual rule of thumb for diluting essential oils is dilutions in a carrier oil at 0.25-0.5% for children, 1% for older children and sensitive adults, on your face, or day to day use, and 2-3% for more acute conditions like acne spot treatment or wounds. What does that look like? For approximately 2 tablespoons of oil or 30 milliliters, 0.5% would be about 2-3 drops of essential oil (total), 1% would be about 5 drops, 2% would be about 10 drops and 3% about 15 drops. A little bit goes a long way. Moreover, properly diluting essential oils will save you money, give you better results and seriously reduce your likelihood of having a bad reaction to them. While this is an oversimplified guide to dilution, it’s a good start. For better accuracy, use a scale (the droplet size of essential oils will differ with their compositions). With that said, the chemical composition of essential oils dictates their effects, including their harshness or potency. For example, essential oils rich in phenol groups (e.g. thyme, clove bud & oregano) or certain aldehyde groups (e.g. lemongrass, cinnamon bark ( shouldn’t be used on your skin)), while often quite therapeutic, are more likely to cause a skin reaction if used past a 1% dilution. Other essential oils contain furocoumarins that can lead to photosensitivity (for example most citrus essential oils, especially bergamot). These essential oils shouldn’t be used before going out into the sun. Finally, some essential oils may be dangerous during pregnancy, breastfeeding or for children (for example clove, rosemary and clary sage). If you’re planning on using essential oils for your kids or yourself as a new mom and are unsure, it may be a good idea to just hold off or to seek the advice of someone who really knows what they’re doing, like a certified aromatherapist.

There are a few important takeaways here. First off, essential oils are extremely concentrated stuff and should be used with respect. Second, if you want to use essential oils on your skin It’s necessary to dilute them in a carrier oil. The final take home, essential oils aren’t always the eco-friendly pick; depending on the crop used. For more information on the sustainability of essential oils visit CropWatch.unl.edu, an organization that monitors crops around the world, including crops meant for essential oil production.

This all being said there are many benefits to using essential oils in our day to day life. For example, lavender can be calming and soothing, perfect for night time baths, skin irritations and cuts. Sweet orange, not only incredibly sustainable is also one of the few citrus essential oils you can safely use before going out into the sun. It’s cheerful and antiseptic, a favourite in baths with kids, and for cleaning products. Tea tree is healing and antiseptic, great for blemishes and cuts.

Top 4 tips for safely using essential oils:

Always dilute your essential oils in carrier oil when applying essential oils to the skin. If you choose to use essential oils on your kids, start with a dilution of 0.25%.

Keep oils away from your eyes and ears, contact here will REALLY hurt. If you happen to get essential oil into either, dip a cotton swab into an oil (e.g. olive oil) and swipe across your eye or dab in your ear to quickly remove it.

Do not use essential oils in teething recipes, this is not safe.

Do not give children essential oils internally or take them when breast feeding or when pregnant. I would also recommend not taking them internally yourself either due to the chance of toxicity, gut flora alteration, esophageal burn, etc.

Bozin B., Mimica-Dukic N., Simin N., Anackov G. (2006) Characterization of the volatile composition of essential oils of some Lamiaceae spices and the antimicrobial and antioxidant activities of the entire oils. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.54(5):1822–1828.

Preservatives are some of the most controversial ingredients around, but why? Unpreserved or poorly preserved cosmetic products would present a serious public health concern for consumers. And yet ‘preservative-free’ product claims abound? This can lead to the belief that preservatives are not only unnecessary but potentially harmful. In this post we’ll cover what preservatives do, cases of contaminated products, types of preservatives out there and the legality of these claims. If you currently believe preservatives are nothing but bad news I implore you to read on with an open mind and try to take what I say in the best possible light.

Why are preservatives used in cosmetic products?

Cosmetic products are preserved to keep us safe. No matter how sterile the manufacturing space and packaging are and how careful we are making the products, as soon as water is introduced into a formulation, microbial growth is inevitable. On top of this, even if the product was able to get to you from manufacturer free of microbe growth, you probably aren't bubble boy right? Most likely your products are kept in the bathroom where it steams up every time you hop in the shower. Every time you interact with a product you are introducing it to new microbial life. Without preservatives, each one of these interactions would be comparable to a game of Russian roulette. All it takes is one small group of bad microbes to turn your cream from this

To this

Image from SoapQueen

At the end of the day, especially in light of how we like to treat our products, cosmetics need to be safe to use during their full shelf life and the only way that’s possible is preservation and challenge testing, to make sure the product can stand up to the microbe pressures of the consumer.

Some of the microbes that have found growing in cosmetic products ranging from lipsticks to lotions include: Pseudomonas sp.(second most common infection in hospitals), Acinetobacter sp (can cause life threatening infections in people who are immunocompromised), Klebsiella (pneumoniae causing), Citrobacter freundii (can cause life threatening infections in people who are immunocompromised), Staphylococcus aureus & epidermidis (causes Staph infections), Streptococcus sp. (causes strep throat and meningitis), Candida sp. (can cause thrush or systemic infection which kills about 50% of infected), Aspergillus sp. (produces the toxin aflatoxin), and many more.

To exacerbate the issue further, natural products tend to be more prone to microbe growth than conventional ones. There’s typically a lot more bioavailable nutrients for bacteria to feed and flourish on. Our skin may love plant extracts and proteins but unfortunately, so do bacteria. Given that most of the ‘preservative-free’ claims on cosmetic products are in the natural sector, this can become a big problem! To add to this, many people changing to all natural are doing so after a health scare or disappointments with conventional products or drugs.These consumers don’t necessarily have a strong immune system to begin with. At the end of the day, no matter if the product is synthetic or natural, proper preservation is of utmost importance.

Image from Cosmetics Europe

So what? What’s the worst that could happen?

Think I’m overstating the importance of preservation in cosmetics? Well, let's talk about some recent cases of cosmetic contamination. In an example presented by Formula Botanica, In Barcelona 2006 at the Universitari del Mar Hospital, five patients were in critical condition due to a bacteremia lower respiratory tract and urinary tract infection. The culprit was the bacterium Burkholderia cepacia, normally lives in soil and water but can spread easily from person to person and present a serious risk for the immunocompromised. Eventually, they found out that the bacteria came from moisturizing lotion that the Intensive Care Unit personal applied to their patients. Further investigation found that the lotion was contaminated at production, shipment or storage. In this case, nobody died, but that’s not always the case. For example, at King Abdulaziz University Hospital in 2009, over fifteen babies were infected with Serratia marcescens from their baby shampoo resulting in one death. Regarding products like eyeliners and mascaras (which are inherently riskier due to how many microbes we introduce per application plus where they’re being applied), there have been numerous cases of consumers going blind from their makeup. Just hop on Google and search ‘cosmetic product recalls from contamination’ and you’ll see that this isn’t just a problem of the past, occurring way too regularly today in 2018.

Now, I’m sorry to be a fear monger here with these examples, but with what we already know about the importance of proper preservation and this growing trend of “preservative free” products I feel public conscious on the issue is in a dangerous place. It’s especially vital that anyone who’s formulating understands this and also helpful for consumers so they know which products to avoid. Outbreaks like the ones above would not only be sad for those affected but could also likely end a small business without the financial backing of the conglomerates in the industry.

So, all products need preservatives?

No all products do not need preservatives. Any formula that incorporates water, with a couple of exceptions, needs a preservative. These products include lotions, creams, shampoos, and makeup. If the product is likely to be contaminated, for example in eyeliner or mascara, even if the product doesn’t have water, it’ll need a preservative. Products that don’t necessarily require a preservative include water-free (anhydrous) products such as balms or oil-based serums, or products that have a very high or low pH, such as castile soap and bar soap. Certain packaging can also help out with lowering your preservative requirements. For example, aerosols have less contact with air and the consumer, therefore, require much less preservation.

For natural formulators, there are a lot of options for you, but creating an effective preservation system can be quite tricky and takes a bit more innovation. For consumers, if there’s water in a formulation and no preservatives, this should be a big red flag. If the product is water-based, stable and lives through its shelf life with a preservative-free claim, flat out they’re lying. For example, companies will often hide their preserving ingredients in the fragrance ingredients/essential oils or in other ingredients not classically defined as a preservative, for example, alcohol. Another trick is using ingredients that have been preserved with a paraben, and only including that ingredient on the ingredient list. I personally think the claim “preservative free” should be illegal on cosmetic products due to how much confusion it’s spreading among consumers, but more on that later.

A note about The Eco Well’s products. If you look at our ingredient lists, you’ll see that our products don’t contain preservatives but you’ll never see that in our marketing anywhere (other than this sentence lol). Due to the fact that we have very limited resources, our products are either soaps or anhydrous (don’t contain water) and therefore won’t support microbial growth and don’t require preservation like water-based products. What about the essential oils? You’re absolutely right, certain essential oils have antimicrobial and preserving effects in products. Thus, even if our products contained water and the essential oils made up an effective natural preservative system, it still wouldn’t be preservative free.

Preservatives found in cosmetic products.

Common conventional preservatives

The big pro for synthetic preservatives is their broad-spectrum effectiveness at very low concentrations. In addition, many synthetic preservatives are actually less allergenic, especially because they are needed at such low amounts, than their natural counterparts. For the cons, most of the health scares for cosmetics seem to lie within this ingredient category. Below I’ll take you through some of the controversies. While you're going through this section, it’s important to keep in mind a few things. Firstly, these ingredients are used at very low concentrations (e.g. about 0.3% of a formula). Secondly and most importantly, a properly preserved product, with any type of available cosmetic preservative, synthetic or not, will always be safer than an unpreserved or poorly preserved product. Example, would you rather find out you have an allergy or a staph infection?

Parabens:

Disclaimer: Due to the controversy of parabens today, I feel a little bit uncomfortable publishing this section. With that said, I’m trying to give you correct information and parabens are an important layer of the discussion. In writing this, I tried to remain as unbiased as possible while reviewing all of the available literature. While there are absolutely people writing that parabens are going to ruin the world, I think a more skeptical approach is important. Here’s what I came up with.

Different types include methyl-, ethyl-, propyl-, isobutyl-paraben, etc. Parabens are widely used because they’re very effective at a low dose, especially compared to all the other preservatives out there. They have no smell or color, are very easy to use, and are generally well tolerated by our skin. At the same time, parabens are one of the most vilified ingredients in the cosmetic industry. The scrutiny seems to stem from a 2004 study, which found traces of parabens in breast tumors. It’s important to note that this study didn’t compare levels of parabens in normal breast tissue to cancerous breast tissue. Instead, journalists reporting on this study drew their conclusions based on the assumption that parabens were found at a higher level in individuals with breast cancer.

Today, parabens are thought to be weak estrogen mimics and potential endocrine disruptors, implicated in a variety of hormonal related problems such as breast cancer, testicular cancer, and declining sperm counts. With that said, in my research through the available literature, most of the conclusions related to adverse health effects were made from anecdotal assumptions or had really unrealistic methods. What do I mean? There hasn’t been a replicated study to show that parabens (especially the ones most commonly used in cosmetics, methyl & ethyl-) cause endocrine or hormonal disruption (especially at the dosage in your cosmetic products) in humans, and there hasn’t been a study that concluded with significant evidence that these chemicals cause the above health issues. Just because it's seen in tissues doesn't mean it's causing harm. Correlation does not mean causation. More studies need to compare paraben concentrations in healthy tissues to diseased tissues, and to determine the actual biological effects (from amounts comparable to our exposure). With respect to the unrealistic methods, most of these studies included mouse models. In the studies, they often included high dose ingestion or frequent application of parabens. I say unrealistic because these would be over 100 times greater concentration for the mice than what’s in an entire cosmetic product. To add, we don’t typically use a product in one application. Instead, we’ll use it over a longer time frame, like a month in the case of shampoo. I’m not going to conclude that parabens are good or bad for our health, but it’s important to know the limitations of the research. More studies need to be done to say conclusively that parabens, at the low levels used in cosmetics, are damaging to our health.

It's worth noting that, with respect to endocrine disruption, while parabens are a weak estrogen mimic, Butylparaben (one of the more estrogenic parabens, these effects increase with carbon chain length/branching) is 10,000 times less potent than estradiol, which they compete with to bind receptors to have an estrogenic effect. Due to a rapid metabolism of parabens, if they do have estrogenic effects, it's probably not through directly activating estrogen receptors.

More concrete troubling conclusions seem to lie within environmental studies. For example, although more than 90% of parabens are removed from our wastewater via treatment plants, they’re still very frequently found in aquatic ecosystems across all of our oceans, particularly methyl- and propylparaben, despite being biodegradable. To make matters worse, halogenated parabens, produced after they come into contact with chlorine in waste treatment, are more persistent in the environment. With that said, while they are found throughout our worldwide aquatic ecosystems, we don't really know if they're actually having an adverse effect on them. More studies need to be done, again, to determine the biological impacts of these ingredients. Given how much more potent our own hormones are, especially when we take things like birth control pills, how do parabens interact with the environment compared to our pee? So many questions yet to be answered.

In cosmetics, many paraben types have been tested to be well tolerated on our skin up to levels of 25%. In contrast, these ingredients typically range from 0.01 to 0.3% in a product. After extensive testing, parabens seem to be the least allergenic preservatives on the market. But, because of some of the research mentioned above, there’s been incredible pressure on the industry to find alternatives. Unfortunately, the alternatives are often more allergenic… which isn’t good news for our emerging skin allergy epidemic. This epidemic may be being driven by antibacterial agents, like parabens and other preservatives, by altering our skin microflora. There’s so much going on here and so much uncertainty now that we’re learning more about our bacterial inhabitants (Read our guide to the skin microflora here!). At the end of the day, in light of all of the available research, it is at best uncertain whether parabens are good or bad.

Formaldehyde Donors:

Different types of formaldehyde donors include DMDM hydantoin, imidazolidinyl urea, and glutaraldehyde. After parabens, these ingredients are the next most common preservatives and are often used now as a paraben replacement. Note, many of these products are further greenwashed by making ‘paraben-free’ claims on their labels. Formaldehyde, in general, was once commonly used as a preservative due to its effectiveness, but due to toxicity, allergenicity and carcinogenicity concerns, this ingredient type is no longer used. Instead, formaldehyde donors were developed. Formaldehyde instead dissociates into formaldehyde when put into a water solution. Since these ingredients still result in formaldehyde in the end product, a different preservative type would be my recommendation. These ingredients are currently banned from cosmetics in Japan and Sweden. In addition, formaldehyde was the 2015 allergen of the year by the American Contact Dermatitis Society.

Phenol derivatives:

This includes phenoxyethanol. Today, phenoxyethanol has become the primary paraben replacer in more natural formulations due to its effectiveness at a low concentration in end formulas. With that said, most certifying bodies deem phenoxyethanol as a taboo ingredient in natural products. This ingredient is a synthetic, not that I think that’s a necessarily a deal breaker, but manufacturers should be honest to their customers with their claims. We’re just trading one synthetic ingredient for another. As for potential risks for this ingredient, most of the health research has been focused on the above two ingredients, there’s not a whole lot of toxicology-related research on phenoxyethanol. With that said, there’s been a growing number of skin allergies related to this ingredient. According to Lene Still (co-founder of AllergyCertified) in a podcast interview we did in November 2017, she anticipates that with the sheer number of manufacturers switching to phenoxyethanol and with its potential allergenicity, that phenoxyethanol will become a common allergen in about a decade (click here to listen to the podcast episode with Lene!). Food for thought.

More Natural Preservatives

The pro’s for natural preservatives can include potential skin and environmental benefits depending on the ingredient, and a nice natural marketing story for a product. The biggest con is that natural preservatives are less effective than the above synthetic preservatives. For example, most aren’t broad spectrum and have to be used at a much higher dosage to be effective. As a result, more skill from the formulator is important to create a preservative system with multiple natural preservatives working together to achieve broad-spectrum protection. In addition, many natural preservatives can be quite allergenic, especially at higher concentrations, depending on the ingredients. Natural preservatives are generally a lot more expensive than their synthetic counterparts. Finally, natural preservatives can add a scent or color to your product, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Because of all of this, with most of our workshops and blog posts, we typically teach at-home crafters water-free formulation types because there’s still a lot you can do there without having to be a chemistry wiz.

Most natural preservatives are weak acids, for example, salicylic acid, sorbic acid, lactic acid, citric acid, benzoic acid, etc. In addition, there are certain herbal ingredients, like certain essential oils, alcohols, and fermented ingredients that can have a preserving effect. If you’re aware of Ecocert, there are quite a few approved natural preservatives available. If Your trying to formulate and keep a natural claim for your product, Ecocert is a very good resource. Again, to use these ingredients effectively, you need to have a good understanding of how they’ll work best. For example, what pH are they effective at? Can they be incorporated into your product in their acid form? There’s a lot of testing that’s required to find the optimal balance. I’m not going to go into any more detail here on specific natural preservatives because there are so many intricacies to cover in a paragraph. Stay tuned for a blog post on natural preservatives.

Note, if an ingredient has a preserving effect, I would classify it as a preservative. You can also be like Lush and say self-preserving… but again, the claim ‘preservative-free’ is complete BS

NOT a preservative

Antioxidants are NOT preservatives. I see them popping up more and more in natural water-based formulas, mostly with home and Etsy crafters, and this is a big concern. While antioxidants can be used to extend the shelf life of an oil and help prevent it from going rancid early, they do not have antimicrobial qualities. Examples of common antioxidants include grapefruit seed extract, rosemary extract and vitamin E. There’s other reasons to add these ingredients to your formula, but preservation isn’t one of them.

Preservative-Free Claims

If there’s a claim in the cosmetic industry that irks me the most, this is probably it. A truly preservative free product would present a serious health risk to consumers. Manufacturers making these claims either don’t know what they’re doing or do and are marketing a lie at worst or misinformation at best, to appease the trendy nature of the industry. If a water-based product is stable and can survive through its shelf life with all of the pressures of the consumer, there is no possible way for this to happen without a preservative. Again, products without water don’t necessarily need a preservative. It seems many manufacturers are using loopholes in the law to make these claims. Even if an ingredient isn’t one of the classic “preservatives” out there for manufacturers, if it has an antimicrobial/preserving effect, it is by definition a preservative. There are also techniques like 'natural hurdle systems' that make the whole formula inhospitable to microbes via things like a low formula pH in combination with different extracts, essential oils, etc. While these systems are very innovative and would be my personal preference for preserving, they are just that, preserving. I honestly don't see why manufacturers who've developed these cool natural hurdle systems don't advertise it. More often, I find that they stick to fear mongering...

Definition of preservative from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary:something that preserves or has the power of preserving; specifically: an additive used to protect against decay, discoloration, or spoilage

These deceptive claims have created an immense amount of confusion for consumers and have ultimately perpetuated a lot of misinformation. I am not a fan of fear mongering marketing tactics like this. Furthermore, I personally think that this claim should be illegal. It’s worth noting that many international agencies agree. In Europe, there’s currently talk of banning this type of deceptive free-from marketing.

As required by the EU Cosmetics Regulation (EC No 1223/2009, Article 20), the acceptability of a claim made on a cosmetic product is determined by its compliance with the common criteria (Legal compliance, Truthfulness, Evidential Support, Honesty, Fairness and Informed decision-making). The EU Commission and the EU Member States published a revised version of the guidelines for the application of the common criterion including ‘free from’ claims (annex III).

Accordingly with respect to preservatives:

‘Preservative free’ is wrong if the product contains an ingredient, not in the official list of preservatives (Annex V) but having antimicrobial properties.

This claim is acceptable except if the product contains an ingredient having properties of this ingredients family as a side function.

Note, this isn’t legally binding yet, but I don’t think manufacturers can plead ignorance in the EU with these recommendations available. Read more here.

Today this potential ban is still a work in progress, but it seems to be a possible decision by the European Commission over the next few years. Should Canada follow suit?

And that’s a wrap! As always, if you have any comments, queries, conundrums or concerns, leave them in the comments section, on any of our social media feeds @theecowell or shoot us an email!

References:

Adoamnei, E et al. (2018) Urinary concentrations of parabens and reproductive parameters in young men. Science of The Total Environment, 621:201-209.

Darbre P and Harvey P. (2014) Parabens can enable hallmarks and characteristics of cancer in human breast epithelial cells: a review of the literature with reference to new exposure data and regulator status. Applied toxicology. 34(9):925-938.

Kolatorova, L et al. (2017) The Exposure to Endocrine Disruptors during Pregnancy and Relation to Steroid Hormones. World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology, International Journal of Medical and Health Sciences, 4(11).

Ever wanted to make your own soap from scratch but not sure where to start? Well look no further! Here’s our ultimate beginners guide to cold process soap making, which covers everything you need to know to get started! Enjoy! :)

First off, what is cold process soap making and how does it differ to other ways of making soap?

This type of soap making involves mixing non volatile animal or vegetable fats/oils with an alkali (i.e. Sodium Hydroxide/Lye/NaOH) to saponify the oils - the oils will change during this saponification reaction and ultimately form soap. Note, after your bars are cured, there is no lye left in your product, only saponified oil. You can also make soap via either hot process or Melt and Pour. Hot process is where you’re actively cooking the soap rather than letting it saponify on its own. In Melt and Pour, you use pre-made soap bases, melt them and then pour your mixtures into a soap mold - no lye required on your end (although it would have been used to make the initial soap base). The big win for cold process is that you have the most control over the ingredients in your soap which will control the look, shelf life and feel of your end product. However, this method is a bit trickier and requires a bit more knowledge about the ingredients you use and how they interact during the process compared to melt and pour. For example, different oils will give you different effects for your bar, certain fragrance and essential oils can react with your mixture at different concentrations, and some color additives either don’t survive the process or turn a different color. In addition, this process requires a 4-6 week curing time. With all of that said, I personally think the benefits far outweigh the challenges in cold process soap making!

Above is the chemical reaction that takes place when you mix oils (triglycerides) with lye (NaOH). As you can see, after the reaction, you end up with soap and glycerin (glycerol) - glycerin is a humectant and a nice moisturizing ingredient that’s often added to other cosmetic products for it’s effects, but conveniently, it’s naturally found in cold process soap making. Cold process soap is as a result also sometimes called glycerin soap. As you can see, there’s no lye left after the saponification reaction takes place.

Fun fact about glycerin in soap making, in the late 1800’s Alfred Nobel discovered the significance of nitroglycerin as an explosive, leading to the invention of practical ways to extract glycerin from soap. The demand for glycerin turned soap manufacturing into a big money business - until the 1940’s, most glycerin was made as a soap manufacturing by-product. This method remained popular until a method to create glycerin from synthetic ingredients, like propylene (from petroleum) was developed. Today, many bigger soap manufacturers remove glycerin from their soaps to use in other products with a higher price tag, like creams. Unfortunately, when glycerin is removed from soaps, they can become very drying to your skin.

Lye Safety

Cold process soap making doesn’t have to feel scary - I hear frequently from folks at our workshops that they’re afraid to use lye. At the end of the day, being aware of the risks and how to mitigate them will make the whole process a lot less intimidating. At the end of the day, if you want to make soap, this ingredient is absolutely essential to saponify your oils and give you a lovely homemade soap.

Lye is an inorganic alkali ingredient that’s extremely corrosive. It’s frequently found in products like drain cleaners due to this effect. This ingredient is very caustic and can burn your skin. With that said, it can be perfectly safe as long as you handle it properly. Lye is available in a variety of forms, such as powder, pellets and flakes. To make your soap, lye is introduced into water (or other aqueous solutions when you get more advanced), dissolving into a lye solution. Mixing water with lye will create a lot of heat and the mixture creates fumes which you should not be inhaling.

Here are a few safety tips to be aware of when you make cold process soap:

When you’re making soap, wear eye goggles, gloves, long sleeves and long pants. This will help protect your skin if you spill any of your soap mixtures onto your skin. For fumes, many soap makers like to wear ventilation masks. Wear this during the whole soap making process.

When you make your lye solution, make sure the place you're making it in has good ventilation.

Always add lye to water and never water to lye. The opposite can result in a bit of an eruption, which you definitely don’t want.

Store your Lye in a clearly labeled container to ensure no one touches it and never store within the reach of children. Also, make sure the lye is in a closed container in a cool and dark place.

If you get Lye on your skin, remove any clothes that were also exposed and flush immediately with lots of water for at least 15 minutes. Do the same if you get it into your eyes. For both cases, if you get burnt, seek medical attention. If you inhale lye, move to fresh air.

Make sure the containers you use to make your lye solution are sturdy, a heat-tolerant plastic or glass. Metal containers are not recommended for they can react with the lye solution and be quite dangerous.

Once you pour your lye solution into the oils, the saponification process begins. As it develops, the lye solution becomes less dangerous. With that said, it can still be extremely irritating to your skin. If your soap batter touches your skin, it may take several minutes to start tingling and burning - be sure to thoroughly wash off as soon as you notice if this happens. Leave your gloves on as you wash your dishes and use grease-cutting soaps.

Note, I’ve never experienced a serious lye burn myself as it’s pretty easy to avoid with the right precautions. I have gotten the batter on my skin many times but was able to wash it off quickly to avoid any serious harm.

Where can you buy Lye? It’s very rare to find this ingredient in stores but pretty easy to find online. I like to purchase my lye from Voyageur Soap and Candle Making Supplies. Wherever you decide to get your lye from, be sure that it’s 100% sodium hydroxide and make sure the vendor is a reputable source. Buying in bulk is a great way to save money on your lye especially if you have a few other soapers to carefully share the ingredient with. To make sure that your lye will work, I recommend using it within a year of purchase and storing it in a tightly sealed and dry place. Note, lye attracts moisture which will make it a lot less effective.

Definitions For Key Soap Making Terms

Trace: After you mix your lye solution into your oils and start mixing, your mixture will eventually turn into a thicker, pudding-like consistency. This is trace. Trace is referred to as light, medium or heavy depending on the thickness of the mixture.

Gel Phase: After you get your soap batter into your mold, the saponification process can cause the soap to heat up - this is your gel phase. This can intensify the colors in your soap and give your soap a nicer end look, ultimately this is a good thing for soap making. With that said, if your soap doesn't go through the gel phase, it doesn't take away from your soap. In fact, many soap makers take steps to prevent this phase. The warmest part of the soap will be the center, the most insulated part where gel phase begins. If you notice that the center of your soap is darker than the exterior (like a dark circle), your soap only went through a partial gel phase. Insulating your soap after molding will help achieve a complete get phase. In contrast, cooling the soap (e.g. in the fridge or freezer after you mold) will prevent the gel phase from happening. Whether or not you want a gel phase is completely up to you.

Here's a great visual by reMeld190 of what a partial gel phase turns into.

Curing: This is where extra moisture from your soaps will evaporate, leaving them harder and more long-lasting. If you use your bars too early, your soap will be slimier, softer and harsher (there still may be a bit of lye left over and the pH will be quite high). A 4 to 6-week curing time for you soaps will give you the gentlest, longest lasting and hardest bar from your mixture.

Look at all those soaps! Here's the curing racks for Soap By The Loaf, one impressively industrious soap maker!

Soda Ash: this is a salt that can develop on the surface of your bars as they cure (note, not actually Soda Ash, that's just what we soap makers like to call it), appearing like a chalky white precipitate. It’s not harmful, it just doesn’t look very good. You can cover your bars as they cure or spray with Isopropyl Alcohol to prevent soda ash from occurring. I personally like to do a water subtraction (somewhere around 10%) from my lye mixture to prevent soda ash, but this is a bit more advanced as your soap batter will trace faster and you’ll therefore have to work a lot faster. If you end up with a bit of soda ash on your bars, you can take a damp cloth after they've cured and do a good job removing it from your beautiful soaps. If you haven't done any swirls or other designs, you can also shave the soda ash away carefully.

Lye Calculator: this tool makes soap making super easy compared to the good ol’ days when you had to calculate all the percentages of your ingredients yourself. This calculator determines how much water and lye and oils, include fragrance or essential oils in a good calculator, to include in your mixtures. Enter in the percentages of oils, and which types, you’d like to use, make sure they add up to 100% and click calculate. You can also adjust the recipe with end pounds of your mixture. Knowing how much weight fits into your molds takes a bit of experimentation but soap molds will often give you suggestions. Soap calculators will often give you estimations of the feel of your bar as well. Every oil will give your soap different effects for your end product. Learning which oils work well for you and which concentrations you prefer will take a bit of experimentation. This is my personal favorite soap calculator. In this calculator, to see your final recipe, click on the view or print recipe after you’ve calculated your recipe.

What kind of equipment do you need to get started?

Aside from of the equipment I recommended in the safety suggestions (heat tolerant and non-reactive containers, gloves, goggles, long sleeve shirt and long pants, etc), there are a couple of tools you’ll need to make soap.

Stick blender: while you can hand stir your soap, this can take hours. A stick blender is an easy way to quickly emulsify your lye and oils to get the saponification reaction going.

Scale: accuracy is key when your making soap, if you're off by even a couple of grams for an ingredient, this can completely ruin your end product depending on the ingredient. Kitchen scales are a nice start, but it may be worthwhile investing in a better digital scale with a higher accuracy and weight allowance as you become a more experienced soaper.

Soap mold: lots of options here but the most common is wood, plastic (old clean Tupperware or yogurt containers can work well) or silicone (by far the easiest type of mold to use because of its flexibility - this makes unmolding very easy). If you use wood, be sure to line the mold. Glass would be safe, but extremely difficult to unmold. Metals aren’t the best idea because the potential for lye to react with them. Be sure to wait until your soap is completely hard (about 24 hours) before you try unmolding.

Rubber spatula: to get all the soap mixture into your soap mold.

﻿Here's one of my favorite soap molds! Not as big as some of the other professional soap molds (usually big boxes where you can make hundreds of uniform rectangle bars), but because the bars lay flat and the tops are open, I can still hand design and mold each bar! The drawback for this specific mold is that I can only make 45 bars at a time - which means, as a soaper that sells soaps, each bar takes significantly more time than if I had one of those large box molds.... but then again, my soaps wouldn't be so pretty <3. I like to get my soap molds and cutters (the thing next to the mold) from SoapEquipment :).

Getting your soap on!

I think the best way to learn how to make soap is to actually give it a try. Here’s a simple recipe to get you started. As you go through the recipe, try following along with the Lye Calculator. Doing this will make it easier for you to experiment with different ingredients the next time.

Step 0: Determine which and how much of your ingredients to use. Head on over to this soap calculator to figure that out. You can see that you the calculator is automatically set to making soap with 1 pound of oils, which is a great amount to start with. In the scroller with all of your oils, add in Olive Oil, Coconut Oil (92 degrees), Cocoa Butter and Castor Oil, which will pop up to the recipe oil list. Note, you’ll have to click the ‘add’ button for each oil. In recipe oil list, put your olive oil at 60%, coconut oil at 25%, castor oil at 10% and cocoa butter at 5% and then click calculate recipe. Next, click view or print recipe. This will bring up a new screen that describes some of the characteristics of your soap and gives you your soap recipe.

Here’s what we got from those calculations for the ingredient amounts:

Lye Solution

172.36 grams of water

63.28 grams of Lye

Oils

272.16 grams of olive oil

113.4 grams of coconut oil

45.36 grams of castor oil

22.68 grams of cocoa butter

This recipe will give you a nice cleansing bar that’s decently hard and has quite bubbly (look at the soap bar quality in the calculator recipe to see how I came up with this).

Notes about the ingredients pertaining to soap making:

Olive Oil: gives you a more conditioning bar but when used alone can result in a softer bar with a poor cleansing effect and hardly any bubbles. You can achieve a harder bar with pure olive oil, the cure time will just be quite a bit longer. I personally always like to add other ingredients to make the bar harder (which will mean more long-lasting), more bubbly and more cleansing.

Coconut Oil: has a very cleansing effect in soap and also produces a harder soap with more bubbles. I like to keep coconut oil under 30% since it is very cleansing and can be quite drying to your skin as a result. For more sensitive or dry skin types, I would consider dropping the coconut oil content down to about 10%. Note, I personally always like to have at least a bit of coconut oil in my soap mixtures because I want my soaps to have at least a bit of a cleansing effect, and coconut oil does a great job achieving that effect.

Castor Oil: quite conditioning and does a good job stabilizing your bubbles, ultimately giving you a nice fluffy lather. I personally always like to use castor oil in my soap. I recommend keeping the percentage of castor oil down to under 10%. If you go above 15% you may end up with a slimy, sticky and not as long lasting of a bar.

Cocoa Butter: quite conditioning and does a great job producing a harder bar. This effect is quite useful, especially when you're using a lot of an ingredient that creates softer bars, like olive oil. I recommend using this ingredient at a percentage under 10%. Any higher can lead to a very hard but brittle bar of soap. Alternatively, you can use palm oil here. If you use palm oil, I suggest making sure you're getting palm oil that’s been certified by the Round Table on Responsible Palm Oil (RSPO) as sustainable.

Now let's get started on the soap making!

Step 1: Get your safety gear on and make sure no kids or pets are around you. Measure out your lye and water amounts with your scale in separate containers. Slowly and carefully add the lye to the water, stirring until the water clears up again. Set aside. Be sure not to breathe in the lye fumes.

Step 2: Measure out and combine all of your oils. You’ll have to melt down your cocoa butter and coconut oil before you add them to the rest of your oils.

Step 3: After your oils and lye solution has cooled down below about 55 degrees Celsius, both ingredients ideally will be at similar temperatures, carefully and slowly pour the lye solution into your oils.

Step 4: Pulse your stick blender to mix the lye solution with the oils and then turn the blender on to blend until you reach a trace. Be sure to have your blender fully submerged before turning it on to keep the mixture in the bowl.

Step 5: After you’ve reached trace, this would be the time to add any fragrance or essential oils or color, starting with the color if you're adding these ingredients in. If you decide to add fragrance or essential oils, flip back to your recipe from the lye calculator. As you can see, you can add 14.18 grams of either of these ingredients. This is a little simplified but it’s a good start. If you added in any of these ingredients, mix them well with the stick blender before pouring your whole mixture into your soap mold.

Step 6: Allow for a day or two to go by before you unmold your soap - it should be nice and hard when it’s ready to unmold. Cut your soaps as you like and let them cure for 4-6 weeks.

There’s so much more to learn to learn about soap making. For example, there’s lots of techniques to learn to make shapes and swirls in your bars, lots of added ingredients other than oils to really amp up your recipes, and lots to learn about the oils you're using and how they will impact your end formula. As a result, I find the whole process extremely fulfilling and very interesting. As a soap maker, refining your craft is an ongoing process that really never stops. But with that said, that’s it for this post! If you have any questions, queries, conundrums, or concerns, leave them below, on any of our social media channels or feel free to shoot us an email!

When trying to make, buy or use products for healthy looking hair, learning about hair biology is a good place to start. The overall structure of your hair tells you a lot about what types of products or ingredients may work well for you, how you should be treating your hair and more. That will be the topic of discussion here. In this blog post, we’ll cover basic hair structure, different hair textures, damage and hair products, including how they interact with your hair biology. Enjoy!

Hair Structure

Your hair is made up of mostly keratin, a strong protein that’s very resistant to wear and tear. Keratin can also be found in nails and horns, but it has a softer feel in hair due to the way the hair is structured. At the cuticle, the overlapping scales (similar to shingles on a roof) are made up of this keratin protein. When in good shape the scales on your cuticle lie flat and stay tightly knit together, giving your hair a smooth and shiny appearance. In damaged hair, the cuticle starts to open up, becoming less tight-knit, and as a result, hair can eventually feel rough, coarse and brittle. This is why most hair products are designed to target the cuticle, although formulators try to make their products able penetrate all the way to the cortex.

Once your hair is damaged, like in the above picture, the best you can hope for hair care products is to temporarily fix (or mask) the problem. Considering hair isn't ‘alive’, these are products you’ll have to keep on applying for your hair to look healthy. An actual fix when your hair is so damaged would be to just cut it and treat it better the next time. But if you're not into that, there’s a hair care product for you :).

The structure of the hair is held together by two types of bonds, hydrogen, and disulfide. The disulfide bonds help to give your hair its strength and elasticity, keeping hair in shape- these bonds are the strongest naturally occurring bonds in nature. Disulfide bonds can be broken with high heat & certain chemicals. While hydrogen bonds in your hair are easily broken by applying water and can be briefly reset with heat - this allows you to temporarily change how your hair looks with heated styling tools, like a blow dryer or curling iron, after you wash your hair. Because of these bonds and the overall structure of your hair, hair is incredibly good at absorbing water and swelling. Hair in good condition can absorb over 30% of its own weight in water, going all the way up to 45% in very damaged hair - the diameter can increase up to about 20%! Styling aside, when your hair swells like this, it’s also more prone to damage.

What texture of hair do you have?

Every hair follicle has a sebaceous gland. Oils released by these glands help give your hair natural flexibility and protection, although these can easily be washed away with surfactants in shampoos. Restoring these natural fats is often the goal of hair products, especially conditioners. Hair also consists of a bit of water, somewhere between 8-14% on average. Like I mentioned above, hair is a good water absorber, making humid environments problematic for your hair. Hair anti-frizz products are designed to combat this effect since hair will behave differently depending on how much water is in it (i.e. become frizzy and more prone to damage). Despite the fact that different hair types can feel more oily or drier, classifying your hair based on these conditions may not make the most sense. This is because the shape and size of your hair really dictate how the water and oil will interact with your hair.

Classifying your hair based on the number of hairs on your head and the follicle diameter (i.e. straight or curly, fine or course) makes the most sense. For example, hair with a larger diameter (e.g. courser hair) is more prone to moisture evaporation and ultimately dry ends. Finer hair, on the other hand, has a much smaller diameter of the hair fibers resulting in a tendency to get oily and limp faster. Fun fact, people with fine hair don’t have less hair, just smaller hair fibers. In fact, they actually have more hairs than any other hair texture. In general, the average number of hairs on our heads is about 120000. Another fun fact, hair diameter changes as we age, starting thin, getting thicker as we approach our middle age, and thinning out as we get older.

Hair Growth

The hair follicles on your head are constantly cycling through these hair growth phases independently of each other. Note, by the time your hair reaches the head, the fiber is dead. As a result, despite marketing claims, you can’t actually make the hair healthier, you can only affect the look of it. Amazingly, approximately every 4 years or so, your whole head of hair has been replaced with new hair. Due to the fact that this growth cycle is unsynchronized at each of the hair follicles, you generally don’t notice this. Hair loss, thinning and issues with hair growth are from disruptions in this growth cycle. These disruptions can be caused by poor nutrition (i.e. restrictive eating), illness and genetics, usually resulting in the anagen phase being cut short and too many hairs entering the telogen phase at the same time. Despite many marketing claims on cosmetic labels, there’s really no effective products, especially in the cosmetic aisle, that actually are able to fix these problems, although there’s lots of research being done to find solutions. At the end of the day though, when a product comes about that’s actually able to target hair growth, the product would be regulated as a drug and not a cosmetic product.

Note: Despite all the hair-loss type products in the market, if regulated by Health Canada they would be pulled off the shelves. Again, aside from these products not being effective, in North America, if a product can interact with your biology in this manner, it must be regulated as a drug, which would require significant efficacy testing, and not a cosmetic product.

Hair Biology Related to Hair Care Products

First things first, the pH of your hair is about 4.5 to 5.5 - quiet acidic. To avoid damaging your hair with your hair products, ensuring the products have been pH adjusted to be suitable for your hair is important. Thinking about the shape and size of your hair will give you a good idea of which type of products will work best for you. For example, different shampoo and conditioning products will be formulated to address different hair types. For products geared to coarser hair, they may be more conditioning agents and they may have less of a cleansing effect. In contrast, products geared to thinner hair, since this hair type has a tendency to get oily faster, will have less heavy conditioning agents.

Shampoos are used to clean away all the grime and skin scales from your scalp. Despite all the hype on the no-poo movement and some possible allergens in these products, dermatological studies typically agree that shampooing relatively regularly (with good shampoos) can help prevent scalp problems, such as dandruff (aside from certain yeasts, dandruff is actually related to an oily scalp rather than a dry one). With that said, the average 4-5 times a week for most North Americans (about double compared to many European countries) may be a wee bit too high. Certain ingredients in common shampoos are a little harsh on the cuticle, for example, anionic surfactants that act as cleansers. Overwashing like this, especially when these ingredients are in the products, can do a bit of damage to the cuticle. There seems to be a happy balance for how often you use shampoo - every 2-3 days may be a good amount to shoot for, but at the end of the day, wash as often as feels good for your hair.

Although shampoos are generally safe and leave your hair feeling more manageable, they also contain ingredients that are factors in emerging skin allergies that may be worthwhile to keep an eye out for. Some of these ingredients include Cocamidopropyl betaine, formaldehyde-releasing preservatives, propylene glycol, certain parabens, and benzophenones.

With respect to the no-poo (no shampoo) movement, most of the claims made regarding shampooing less for more balanced hair are completely anecdotal. In addition, something that’s quite common in this movement is washing your hair with baking soda. Remember how I said your hair is quite acidic? Well, baking soda is very alkaline with a pH at about 9. Washing with this ingredient will almost certainly damage your hair, most likely leaving your hair feeling more like straw.

Conditioners on the other hand help to detangle hair, reduce frizz, seal the cuticle, and enhance the shininess and smoothness of your hair. Conditioners are made up of a variety of moisturizing and conditioning ingredients that are left behind after you rinse - this is key in conditioners. These ingredients include different surfactants (quaternized), silicones, humectants, emollients, proteins, B vitamins (especially panthenol/B5), etc. While silicone can definitely help to make your hair nice and smooth, if it’s too high in the ingredient list of a product (i.e. top three ingredients), it can cause brittleness and dullness. Dimethicone is the most widely used silicone in the hair care industry. Finally, to get the best bang out of your shampoo and conditioners, when you shampoo, use it mostly on the roots of your hair and scalp. When you condition, especially if you have thinner hair, apply it mid-shaft to tips, avoiding your scalp.This will save you money, keep your hair healthier looking and make it easier not to shower every single day.

Note, while certain organizations deem silicones as bioaccumulative to the environment and potentially bad for us (i.e. an endocrine disruptor), there’s actually not a whole lot of evidence to support these claims. In addition, there are many different types of silicones used in the cosmetic industry. At the end of the day though, more research should be done to further evaluate these ingredients. If your formulating products, blends of waxes and botanical oils can offer a nice and natural silicone replacement.

There’s so much more to learn about hair biology and hair care products but I think this is a good start! If you have any questions, queries, conundrums or concerns, leave them below in the comments, on The Eco Well's Facebook page or shoot us an email!

As the cosmetic industry goes greener, making sure the ingredients that we’re using are both sustainably and ethically sourced is paramount. While we’re certainly taking strides to demand transparent manufacturing, the natural beauty industry, as well as consumers, have been more focused on using ‘natural’ ingredients rather than ensuring their sustainability. I find that time and time again, people equate natural as good, synthetic as bad, but in what context are we talking about? If it’s the environmental and social impact of an ingredient, it seems that we’re forgetting - the whole supply chain has an impact, from initial sourcing of raw materials all the way to how we as consumers use and dispose of the product, or how our water treatment facilities are able to deal with the ingredients used. It’s simply not so cut and dry, especially when, natural ingredients are often the culprits for huge environmental impacts as well as slavery at the bases of the supply chain. In this post, I’ll take you through some basic definitions, some of the issues regarding sustainability and social impacts of cosmetic ingredients, how we’re moving forward as an industry to address these problems, and how you can help. Note, I’m clearly not opposed to natural ingredients, as my own business is a natural cosmetic business - it’s just important to do things right.

Disclaimer, this article is focused on raw ingredient sourcing and the supply chain. The end of product life and how it’s ingredients impact the environment post-consumer is another important consideration that I only will briefly touch upon.

What is sustainable?

Sustainable: Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Brundtland Commission, 1987

Sustainability sounds simple but when put into practice ends up being anything but. With respect to sourcing raw materials, if they’re sustainable, they should still be there for us in 50 years if we change nothing with how we’re sourcing. If an ingredient is sustainable for us today, it should also be able to withstand our changing climate, which will only become more important. A sustainably harvested ingredient won’t be disruptive to its surrounding ecosystems and will be harvested in a way that will ultimately help serve the communities that are doing the harvesting. Slave and child labor is clearly something that doesn’t fit into sustainability. As such, economic sustainability is an important consideration.

When it comes to actually producing the product, how big is the carbon footprint there? How much energy and water is needed and how is waste managed at the end of the day? Is the packing compostable, biodegradable or recyclable? Is the product biodegradable? Triple Bottom Line is an accounting framework coined by John Elkington (1994) that looks at the social, environmental and financial impact of a product or ingredient. This framework is a great way to evaluate sustainability.

Issues regarding sustainability and social impacts of raw cosmetic ingredients and their supply chains

There are so many inherent risks with most supply chains, especially when the ingredients are coming from impoverished regions. These include environmentally destructive harvesting and slave and/or child labor, which can often lie right at the base of a supply chain. At the end of the day, whatever ingredient your using, the only way to ensure its sustainability is to have a good understanding of your supply chains. Below are 2 hot-topic cases that apply to the sourcing of cosmetic ingredients.

Mica: A mineral that adds a sparkle effect to many cosmetic products, very commonly seen in makeup. This ingredient isn’t just limited to the cosmetic industry, it’s heavily used in a number of other industries including technology, cars, paint, construction, etc. Today, most of the mica is sourced from India, where child labor has remained prevalent for mining of the mineral. Jharkhand and Bihar are responsible for roughly 25% of the world's production, and according to areport by the NGOs SOMO and Terre des Hommes, about 20,000 children work in the mines there. The huge problem of poverty in these regions makes children especially vulnerable as the families need more income in their households.

While outright boycotts for this ingredient is probably not the right move since so many poor communities depend on the mica mines for their income, even for larger businesses, ex. Lush (opted to remove mica from all of their ingredients in 2014) it’s extremely difficult to ensure ethical sourcing given all of the challenges. There are a few initiatives like “child-friendly villages” (a joint initiative by the National Resources Stewardship Council and the Indian NGO Bachpan Bachao Andolan) that may help offer a solution, but a lot more work needs to be done. These are issues that manufacturers should be aware of as they (should at least) carefully monitor their supply chains.

Palm Oil: The most heavily used vegetable oil out there, used across many industries for its low cost and versatility. Today, over 58 million tonnes are produced annually, with 85% coming from Indonesia and Malaysia. In the early days of palm oils popularity, companies would freely clear rainforests to make room for their palm plantations, resulting in huge amount of biodiversity and wildlife loss as well as carbon output, since burning was an easy way to clear-cut. Social issues are also quite prevalent with this crop. As a result of all of these problems, it would be easy to say that a boycott for the crop would be best, however, most organizations, scientists, and businesses working in this sector agree that that’s not the answer. For one, palm oil is one of the most resource-efficient crops out there (i.e. requires less water, not as hard on the soil, etc). If we say no to palm, we’ll have to say yes to another crop, which won’t have the same sustainability potential as this crop. At the end of the day, we would really just be shifting the problem. The sector also employs about 6 million people worldwide, 2.2 million of which are smallholder farmers living at the edge of poverty. There’s a good chance that a lot of people would die of starvation if we stopped using this crop altogether.

Palm oil can be harvested in a sustainable way, including no deforestation or exploitation - the communities and farmers that are doing the harvesting just need support. The Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) was founded in 2004 to bring various players in the sector together to work together to help address unsustainable palm. One of their initiatives is to help train the smallholder farmers to understand more sustainable harvesting. Sustainable palm can ultimately be a huge win-win for everyone involved. While sustainable palm (certified by the RSPO) isn’t perfect today, it’s definitely moving in the right direction. To continue on their positive path, I think that industry support will prove very important. Again, if manufacturers are using palm oil, they should be vigilant to ensure they’re sourcing in a sustainable way, which may include, in this case, opting for RSPO certified palm.

Other examples of commonly used cosmetic ingredients where sustainability has been an issue include Sandalwood, Frankincense, Vetiver, Olive, Argan, many clays, many other essential oils, etc.

Steps in the right direction

Today, there are so many organizations working to improve these issues along with legal acts that are coming into place to ensure sustainable supply chains. Some of these acts include the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act, The Nagoya Protocol, and the Modern Slavery Act, although many haven’t quite made their way to Canada. If you’re interested to learn more I recently sat down with Anne from ChainPoint software. They use software to map out the supply chain of an ingredient or product and help identify problem areas. I also sat down with Andrew Wallis, the founder of Unseen, the organization responsible for the modern Slavery Act. Their Interviews can be found here (Anne) and here (Andrew) (coming soon!).

Source: supplychain247.com

How you can formulate or purchase more sustainable products

For formulators, getting information from your suppliers about your ingredients supply chain is key. Are the ingredients being sourced in an ethical and sustainable way? How are your suppliers demonstrating this to you? Do they have certification available? How reliable is their certification? It may be worthwhile to think about support from other businesses and organizations out there, for example, supply chain mapping or consultation from an organization that will work towards no slavery in your supply chain. If you opt for the consultation route, evidence-based perspectives are important. For consumers, it’s a bit difficult but my best suggestion would be to get to know manufacturers and the ingredients in your cosmetic products. Do their values align with yours? How do they ensure that their ingredients are sourced ethically and sustainably?

If you have any questions, queries, conundrums or concerns, leave them below in the comments, on The Eco Well's Facebook page or shoot us an email!

Your skin is an incredibly important organ, serving as the interface between your body and the outside world. It prevents water loss, protects against invading pathogens, maintains structure and more. It also hosts a variety of different immune cells and acts as a complex immune organ. Your skin's structure and function is absolutely essential to your general health. In our last post about skin biology, we took you through some basics about physiology and how cosmetics may interact with your skin. Something we brushed upon was the importance of the microorganisms that colonize your skin. In this blog post, that will be the focus. We’ll take you through what your skin flora is, how it impacts your skin health, how cosmetics may interact with it, and more!

Skin Microflora in a Nutshell

Microflora:bacteria and microscopic algae and fungi, especially those living in a particular site or habitat. - Collins English Dictionary

By now, you’ve probably heard about the importance of your gut microflora, an exploding area of research today. Your general health seems to be largely regulated by the bacteria that live within your digestive tract. For example, the presence of different bacterial species as well as the diversity of the colony seems to be very important, with low diversity being linked with poor health, chronic diseases, allergy and more. Thanks to this realization, probiotics and probiotic rich foods have seen a huge boom in popularity over the last 2 decades. With such an emphasis on gut flora, it would be easy to assume that that’s the most important flora for us, but did you know that bacteria can be found all throughout your body where they are increasingly known to play an important role in function? This includes on your skin.

Source: Science Direct

Between one million and one billion microorganisms inhabit each square centimetre of your skin, including bacteria, archaea, fungi, protozoans and arthropods. At the end of the day, a small group of bacteria are what ultimately dominate your skin. Interestingly, there are many pathogenic microbes (i.e. those that ‘cause harm’) that are normal members of a healthy flora - we’re now starting to shift our perspectives on them to see there's somewhat of a ‘mutualistic-pathogen continuum’ - in essence, they’re not all bad, and sometimes important.

While the skin can be thought of as one big ecosystem, it’s made up of many habitats and microbial communities. For example, dryer areas of your skin, for example on your forearm, generally have the richest diversity of microbes, are easier spots for new microbes to penetrate, and are quite susceptible to variability depending on your environment and lifestyle. In contrast, more sebaceous environments, such as your face, have much lower diversity, dominated by Propionibacterium acnes, and is a harder area for outside microbes to penetrate. This is because the sebaceous gland activity makes the skin of your face a more hostile environment compared to dryer areas of your skin.In general, your skin can be inhabited by bacteria from your environment, although it seems to have a strong selective filter (i.e. unsuitable for most microbes to live due to the acidity, salinity, etc) that protects us from harmful invaders. As a result, normal and healthy skin in whatever skin habitat has a limited number of bacteria species.

Source: Human Microbiome Map

Like I mentioned earlier, your skin is the first and largest barrier for your body; it hosts a complex ecosystem that involves both immune cells and microflora. It seems that these two groups co-evolved to the immune organ that skin is today, similar to your gut flora, working together to protect us from harmful invaders.Moreover, in humans, the maturation of our immune systems, including at the level of our skin, are dependent on microbe exposure.

Although skin microflora seems to be relatively stable, disruptions in the populations, often by environment, hygiene, cosmetics, antibiotics, etc., may disrupt that mutualistic-pathogen relationship I mentioned earlier. When this happens, the microbes can instead set in motion the production of inflammatory molecules (cytokines) by the skin, leading to a reduction of overall structure and function; this can ultimately lead to a slew of problems. For example, as function and integrity go down, more water is able to escape our body through the skin. This is a key feature in the development of skin allergy, eczema, and other skin disorders. Although genetics is definitely partially responsible for the skin flora, they can’t account for the dramatic global increase in skin allergy and eczema. Treating our skin flora better may be the key that we’ve been missing in the past few decades for healthier skin.

Source: Journal of Drugs in Dermatology

There’s a significant association between skin allergy and microbial composition. For example, in a recent study, Staphylococcus aureus colonization and reduced microbial diversity was seen in over 90% of individuals with eczema compared to less than 5% in unaffected individuals.

Hygiene, Cosmetics and the Skin Flora

Despite all the research on the importance of hygiene on lowering disease transmission, the effects this has on our skin microbiota are only starting to be considered. Through the widespread acceptance of the germ theory, a misconception arose that ‘all microbes=germs’, which has influenced our modern idea of hygiene, now synonymous with sterilization. The history of hygiene regulations, for example in healthcare settings, reflect this. Nearly all studies in the past, prior to the last few years, that have looked at hygiene, look at a reduction of all the bacteria on our skin as a proxy for lower disease transmission. It’s obvious that such a proxy was too broad. We’re discovering now that overwashing, especially with antibacterial soap, as well as using antibiotic creams (often used in dermatology) or even highly preserved cosmetic products, may not bode well for your skin flora. A better mode of hygiene may be working with the skin flora rather than trying to strip it all away, as we’re now learning.

Source: Trends in Microbiology

There's an emergence and potential transfer of antibiotic resistance in the skin microorganisms. This is concerning especially in dermatology, where antibiotic ointments are extremely common. This poses serious problems with managing skin diseases in the future, for example, acne, as antibiotic resistance continues to evolve, for example in P. acnes.

There’s some really interesting research currently being done to give us an alternative to some of our cosmetic products, skin treatments, and hygiene products that we’ve become accustomed to. For example, investigations for potential microbial transplants and probiotic treatments for problem skin. In a 2017 study by Seite S et al, they applied a bacterial emollient with good (non-pathogenic) bacteria to patients with atopic dermatitis (double-blind, randomized with 60 patients with moderate atopic dermatitis). They were able to significantly normalize the skin flora and reduce the number and severity of flare-ups compared to the placebo group. Note, this type of treatment with bacteria/probiotic ointments for dermatitis has had some success during the last few years of research (i.e. replicated results). Similar research is also currently being done for a variety of other skin ailments, for example, acne, eczema, and psoriasis. In addition, with respect to preservatives and actives in our cosmetic products, new ingredient innovations are happening at a rapid pace to give us fermented, probiotic or other similar preserving and treatment alternatives that may be a better option for our skin flora. More research is obviously needed, but you can be sure that you’ll see more of these products in the beauty aisle over the next decade.

Source: Teen Vogue

Cool Science Alert: Skin makes and metabolizes steroid hormones, peptide neurohormones and neurotransmitters, which may be influenced by the microbe colonies, according to a 2016 study by Denda M. According to the study, the skin can even influence whole body states and emotions! Just like the gut flora, the skin flora activities are likely to extend far past the skin as this study demonstrated. Here’s another reason to treat those tiny guys on your skin well.

And that's a wrap! If you have any questions, queries, conundrums or concerns, leave them below in the comments, on The Eco Well's Facebook page or shoot us an email!

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/essential-oil-chemistry-basics2017-12-02T10:02:00-05:002017-12-02T10:35:51-05:00Essential Oil Chemistry BasicsJen Novakovich
Just like any molecule, the chemical structure of essential oils really dictates how they’ll act. For example, will they be harsh on your skin, what potential therapeutic effects might they have, what should they be dissolved in, are there safety concerns, and so on. Essential oils are incredibly complex molecules that have some pretty interesting actions. I decided to write the following blog post for all of you who are keen on learning a bit of the chemistry that makes essential oils what they are. In this post, I’m not going to go through anything past structure since there’s so much to know on that front. You definitely don’t have to know all of the biochemistry here to use essential oils, but having a bit of understanding will only enhance your understanding of their end effects. With that said, I think that anyone who’s a practitioner or formulator whose using essential oils should learn some of the chemistry because it will give you a good grounding on essential oil characteristics (and the ‘why’) down the line. That’s my two cents! :)

What is an essential oil?

Imagine walking through a thicket of mint, you’d smell the aroma emanating from the mint. If you pick up a mint leaf and crunch it with your fingertips, you would notice some oil being released from the plant and a burst of aroma. Now, say you put the leaf under the lens of a strong microscope. You would notice fat globules interspersed throughout the matrix of the plant. That’s the essential oil. Quite simply, essential oils are the aromatic volatile components of aromatic plants. In nature, they serve as a defense against pests, a means for communication between plants, and a tool to attract pollinators.

Plants have several strategies for warding off predators, including defensive chemicals known as secondary plant metabolites (called secondary because they’re not needed for primary cell functions, e.g. photosynthesis). Essential oils form part of this plant arsenal.

Molecules that make up essential oils

Essential oils are made up of a wide diversity of different molecules, with lots of crossover from plant to plant. For example, the molecule 1,8-cineole can be found in the makeup of essential oils from rosemary, tea tree, eucalyptus, spike lavender and more. Essential oils with a higher content of this particular molecule tend to be good decongestants yet not the greatest for young children. The molecule Limonene can be seen in most citrus essential oils. This light molecule makes for essential oils that are nice ‘top notes’ in perfumery, good cleaners, yet shorter on the shelf-life side of things. Essential oils are incredibly complex and can contain hundreds of individual constituents like these.

Made via mevalonic acid biosynthetic pathway (same as for carotenoids and sterols as well as cholesterol and steroids in animals). Isoprene units (5 carbon molecule) is the starting point to make terpenoids, which are easily linked together to form longer branched carbon chains.

Terpenes in essential oils are typically either Monoterpenes, which have two isoprene units (i.e. 10 carbon units), or sesquiterpenes, which have three isoprene units (i.e. 15 carbon units). These can be further modified with ‘functional groups’ (when they have a functional group added, they’re called terpenoids)

Since these are smaller molecules, these will evaporate a lot more rapidly, dissolve slightly in ethanol and are often thought of as ‘top’ notes in perfumery (i.e. first smells you pick up in a blend). Combine with oxygen from the air over time which will create harshness/higher skin irritancy in the essential oil. Important to keep containers tightly sealed and away from light and heat. These oils tend to have shorter shelf lives compared to other essential oils.

Don’t dissolve readily in ethanol like monoterpenes. Not as volatile, often thought of as middle or base notes in perfumery. Woody oils tend to be sesquiterpenoid in character.

Phenolic (and phenylpropanoid) molecules: There are only a few phenolic compounds found in essential oils.

Made via shikimic acid pathway (same as for tannins in tea). They have a distinctive benzene or aromatic ring.

Phenols have a hydroxyl (-OH) group attached to the ring. Phenylpropanoids typically have a methyl ether functional group attached to the ring, and a propenyl tail (3-carbon chain with one c=c bonded to the ring by one end.

Due to the exposed oxygen in the molecule, essential oils with a lot of phenol constituents (phenolic essential oils) are potent antioxidants, potential to be very therapeutic, but also potentially harsher on your skin compared to other essential oils. These essential oils should be diluted lower than many of the other essential oil groups.

Non-Terpenoid aliphatic molecules: Found in citrus peel oils.

‘Aliphatic’ describes molecules made up of carbon chains that are linear, not forming any ring structure. Usually only found in trace amounts in essential oils but usually still have noticeable odors despite this when they have oxygenated functional groups.

Heterocyclic molecules: these contain atoms other than carbon in a closed ring. Found in only a few oils.

Made up of carbons that are arranged in a ring, either with nitrogen or oxygen included. Very uncommon, found mainly in ‘heady’ floral oils such as neroli and jasmine. Rarely seen in essential oils that have been steam distilled as they’re soluble in water.

Note: there is a lot of variation in compositions of essential oils from different species. Same species will also have variations depending on harvest time, geo-climatic locations, extraction process, etc. ‘Chemotype’ describes essential oils with different compositions of the same species of plant. E.g. Spanish rosemary (chemotype 1) has higher levels of camphor compared to Tunisia rosemary (type 2), which has higher amounts of 1,8-cineole. If you want to know what the essential oil may do, including usage or safety concerns, knowing the chemotype of an essential oil can be very important.

Functional Groups

Functional groups are found attached to the monoterpene or sesquiterpene skeletons. Note, there can be more than one functional group in a molecule. The functional group(s) give molecules their distinct properties. Again, I’m not going to go into any of the potential skin effects of these groups, but we’ll definitely explore that in a future blog post. With that said, I recommend making generalizations for effects across a certain functional group with caution.

Note: The overall polarity of an essential oil influences how it acts. Essential oils with oxygen-containing functional groups (i.e. alcohols, phenols, aldehydes and ketones) are polar at the oxygen atom site. The presence of an exposed oxygen (electronegative) makes the molecule more interactive, which may make the essential oil more of an antioxidant, potentially more therapeutic, and also potentially harsher. Non-polar molecules have no strongly electronegative atoms (e.g. terpenes)

Alcohols: Have hydroxyl (-OH) group attached to one of their carbons. Note, phenols are a type of alcohol, but since they aromatic ring, they’re classified differently than other alcohols.

The oxygen in these essential oils make them more of an antioxidant, sometimes more therapeutic and also sometimes a lot harsher on your skin, particularly with the phenol group. The exposed oxygen site is also 'polar' (like water) while the rest of the molecule is nonpolar (won't dissolve in water). Generally, these essential oils, especially the monoterpenols, will have a slight solubility in alcohol, in addition to oil, which essential oils generally dissolve in. The monoterpenols have a slight solubility in water. In addition, the alcohol-rich essential oils will oxidize over time and create a harsher oil. It's important to keep these oils away from light, heat, and air.

Aldehydes: Have a carbonyl group on an end carbon unit. Derived from alcohols via oxidation. Namin ends with either the word ‘aldehyde’ or ‘-al’.

Examples:

Citronellal (C9H17CHO monoterpenoid): Citronella (35%)

Neral (C9H15CHO monoterpenoid): Lemongrass (35%), Melissa (35%)

Geranial (C9H15CHO monoterpenoid): Lemongrass (50%), Melissa (20%)

Note: Since carbonyl groups are polar, small molecules here are slightly soluble in water as well as in ethanol and oil. Can be irritating to the skin due to their chemical structure, low dilution recommended.

Ketones: Contain carbonyl group like the aldehydes, but always on a carbon atom that's bonded to two other carbons. Naming ends with “-one”.

Note: Slightly soluble in water as well as in ethanol and oils. These molecules are relatively stable and can pose serious problems upon ingestion because they're resistant to liver metabolism. Several ketones can have toxic effects at very low dosages (e.g. camphor at about 3g). In addition, certain ketones, such as camphor, are unsafe for young children (should be kept away from their faces).

Acids and esters: Acids in plants known as carboxylic acids, mostly non-terpenoids allowing them to be soluble in water. Most are extracted into hydrosols in distillation. These groups are easily combined with alcohols to form esters. Esters are often formed or broken down during steam distillation. Naming for esters are after the name of both parent molecules (e.g. linalool +acetic acid becomes linalyl acetate)

Note: most ethers, cyclic ethers & oxides are soluble in ethanol. Of the functional groups, cyclic ethers and oxides possibly produce the strongest odors and can give essential oils their distinctive smell at as low of a percentage as 0.3% (rose oxide in Rosa damascena oil). Certain oxides, particularly 1,8-cineole (i.e. eucalyptol) are known to have neurotoxic effects in children - shouldn't be used near the faces of young children. This essential oil constituent can also cause respiratory irritation, particularly in people with asthma.

Lactones: Can be mono- or sesquiterpenoids and always have a carbonyl group (c=o) next to an oxygen atom that's part of a closed ring. Not found in as many essential oils compared to the previous functional groups. Tend to end in -lactone, but can also end in -in, or -ine.

CoumarinesHave a lactone ring joined to a benzene ring that can have several functional groups attached. Tend to end with, -in, but can also end with -one in naming.Furanocoumarins (also known as psoralens) such as bergaptene, have 5-membered furan ring attached to the coumarin. Many of these constituents make for oils that are photosensitivity causing (in most of the citrus family).

Note: Solubility is an important consideration for the essential oils. In general, essential oils are able to dissolve into vegetable oils (like dissolves like). Monoterpenes and sesquiterpenes are non-polar hydrocarbons and therefore not soluble in water. However, oxygen-containing functional groups (e.g. hydroxyl groups) can result in a slight solubility depending on how big the molecule is, the boundary between the oil and water layers will be less distinct. Here, it’s possible to get to a temporary emulsion of water with certain monoterpenoids with -OH functional groups by using hot water and shaking vigorously (e.g. geranium oil which has a high percentage of geraniol, a monoterpenol). Ethanol is both a polar and a non-polar solvent due to it’s -OH on the one end and c2h5 on the other. Perfumers use ethanol because it can dissolve many essential oils and also water, allowing for a subtle emulsification. Most monoterpenoids are moderately soluble in ethanol. Bigger molecules such as sesquiterpenoids are too big to be soluble.

If you made it through this post, you probably have come to a better understanding of the complexity of essential oils and the importance of knowing a bit about their chemistry. For each of the molecule types, we’re really only just brushing the surface here. With that said, if you decide to do further research on essential oils, some of the above will give you some good search terms to learn more. Keep in mind, we’ll be exploring each of the topics further on The Eco Well blog.

Bozin B., Mimica-Dukic N., Simin N., Anackov G. (2006) Characterization of the volatile composition of essential oils of some Lamiaceae spices and the antimicrobial and antioxidant activities of the entire oils. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry.54(5):1822–1828.

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/a-brief-overview-of-skin-biology-related-to-cosmetics2017-11-24T16:42:00-05:002017-11-25T08:40:39-05:00A brief overview of skin biology related to cosmeticsJen Novakovich
The biology of your skin tells you a lot about how you should be treating it, including what type of cosmetic products you should be using and why they may work. I find diagrams the easiest way for me to piece together physiology type information. As a result, I put together the following diagram to give you a better picture of the important things related to cosmetics in skin biology. I know this diagram is a wee bit sciency, but if you just bear with me and read through all the paragraphs, you'll come to a better understanding of the skin you live in :).

And that's a wrap, short and sweet. There's so much more to learn about skin biology and impacts from cosmetic products, but you'll just have to stay tuned for more blog posts on that if you're interested :). If you have any questions, conundrums or queries, feel free to leave a comment or send us an email through our contact page.

Color additives in cosmetics include dyes and pigments, this group of ingredients is the most tightly regulated group in the cosmetic industry today. They play an important role in making creams and shampoos seem more appealing, or for make-up in actually staining the skin. In my experience, there seems to be a bit of misinformation floating about on the internet regarding these ingredients. As a result, I’m writing this post to give you a brief breakdown of color additives, including must-know details about safety, usage and more. Enjoy!

A Historical Perspective

All the way back to ancient times, colored cosmetics were popular in many cultures. By 4000 BCE, for example, Egyptian women applied galena mesdemet (from copper and lead), malachite (from copper) and other naturally occurring colors (e.g. paprika) to their faces, often signifying their class. Moving through history, ingredients like henna dyes or rice powders have been seen in many cultures, for example, China, Japan, India and North Africa. By the 1500s, European women often lightened their skin with a variety of colored products, including white lead paint. Queen Elizabeth I of England was a well-known white lead user, which may have also been a product that led to her death. By the 1800s, zinc oxide began to replace some of the deadly lead and copper white mixtures that had killed many women in previous years. By 1856, William Henry Perkin discovered the first synthetic dye, mauve, and similar dye discoveries quickly followed. Due to the fact that these dyes were initially produced from byproducts of coal processing, they were labeled “coal-tar dyes”. By the 1900s, many artificially colored cosmetics became available and began to grow in popularity.

After a number of cases of consumers getting sick from their cosmetic products, the ingredients were assessed to find that many synthetic colors contained a variety of poisonous chemicals, for example, lead, arsenic, and mercury. The Food and Drug Act. in 1906 was passed to prohibit the use of these dangerous ingredients and offer more protection to consumers. By the 1920s and 30s, it became clear that the original Food and Drug Act of 1906 didn’t go far enough to protect consumers from their cosmetics. As a result, the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act of 1938 came about to offer more regulation specific to cosmetics. By the 1960s, new amendments came about to prohibit the use of color additives demonstrated to be a carcinogen.

Today, color additives are very tightly regulated due to the historical risks of these ingredients.There is currently a long list of color additives that aren’t allowed in cosmetic products. There are also restrictions for the area of use for color additives. For example, if a manufacturer wants to make a lipstick, they have to use only color additives that have been approved for use on lips. Finally, due to demonstrated risks of contamination with heavy metals, once naturally derived ingredients, for example, Iron Oxides, have to be now made in a lab to ensure consumer safety. As a result, aside from botanicals, which generally aren’t used in make-up due to their drawbacks (e.g. poor mixing and staining abilities plus possibilities of skin irritation or smell), store-bought “all-natural” makeup doesn’t really exist anymore.

For more 'light' reading on the subject of colored cosmetics through history, I really enjoyed this article on lipsticks through the 1900s.

Color Additives Today

Color additives used in cosmetics fall into either of the following two groups: organic or inorganic. The word organic here isn’t the marketing term we see in the grocery store. Instead, organic indicates that the chemical structure of the color additive includes carbon atoms. Organic color additives include synthetic dyes, lakes, and botanicals while the inorganic color additives include many mineral based colors, for example, iron oxide and zinc oxide. While many of the colors found in the inorganic group can be found in nature today, all of these color additives are synthetic and made in a lab to ensure consumer safety (e.g. nature identical). While the mineral mica is indeed natural, it is coupled in a lab with color additives, which can be either inorganic or organic, to give it a color. Thus, micas found in cosmetics are also not technically natural either. The only truly natural color additives in cosmetics used today include those of the botanical group, for example, turmeric, beetroot, spirulina, etc. Again, due to their poor effects on staining and mixing, and possible smell, these ingredients aren’t commonly found in make-up cosmetic products.

Top Need-to-Know’s

The term “natural” on labels is currently unregulated. As a result, you can still see many make-up manufacturers who use Iron Oxides make claims that they’re 100% natural. Considering that these ingredients are actually synthetic, I personally think that this label is a wee bit dishonest for these types of products… And the Federal Trade Commision seems to agree. Last year in 2016, 5 companies falsely claiming “all-natural” while using these ingredients were charged, and it seems that these charges will affect more companies over the next few years.

There is a large problem of slave labor within the mica mining industry, accounting for at least 80% of the Mica available today. As a result, many companies have opted to remove this ingredient type from their products until these issues are better understood and addressed. There are ethical sources of mica available - if you purchase this ingredient or buy a product from a manufacturer who uses mica, it would be worthwhile asking if they monitor their mica supply chain to ensure it’s not mined via slave labor.

Many organic dyes ('coal tar' dyes) have been linked with adverse health effects compared to many of the inorganic pigments. As a result, many industry watchdog organizations deem this group of color additives unsafe. For example, certain ‘coal tar’ dyes (note, no longer made from coal tar) have been linked with cancer, Hodgkin's lymphoma, hyperactivity in children, endocrine disruption, etc. With that said, the available peer-reviewed evidence could be stronger. For example, for the most part, it includes very small sample sizes in humans, animal trials with sometimes questionable methods (e.g. hyper dosing the ingredient) and studies that have yet to be replicated, which would demonstrate significance. More evidence is needed to lump all of the organic dyes into the “bad box” with confidence. With that said, as you’ll see with the chart below, due to those bits of evidence, our preferences are in the inorganic pigment group as well as many of the botanical pigments (although much harder to work with). Coal tar dyes on a label can include the following: FD&C: Blue No. 1, Blue No. 2, Green No. 3, Yellow No. 5, Yellow No. 6, Red No. 3 and Red No. 40. Orange B and Citrus Red No. 2 (allowed but with restricted use) D&C: Black No. 2, Black No. 3, Green No. 5, Orange No. 5, Red No. 6, Red No. 7, Red No. 21, Red No. 22, Red No. 27, Red No. 28, Red No. 30, Red No. 33, Red No. 36, and Yellow No. 10. Lakes can also include these dyes. P-phenylenediamine is a specific coal tar dye that is approved for use in only hair dyes, with warnings for the use on skin. This dye is linked to skin sensitization and allergy as well as with cancer (note, much stronger evidence here).

Color additives on cosmetic labels may also include a Color Index (CI) number, the European Union method of identification. This applies to all color additives.

The information presented in this blog post only is brushing the surface. There is so much chemistry, legislation and biology to grasp to really understand the complexity of color additives. If you’re a formulator or a DIY Beauty enthusiast, we suggest that, if you chose to use color additives in your cosmetic products, especially for makeup related products, refer to the available Health Canada or the FDA resources to make sure that the color additives you're using are safe and legal for where you’re going to apply it and in what concentration. I personally find diagrams to be one of the easiest ways for me to see the bigger picture so I put together the following diagram to cover some of the information covered above and some of the things we didn’t get to. I know there’s a lot going on, but if you read through each of the bubbles, you’ll hopefully come to a better understanding of the world of color additives in cosmetics.

Thanks for reading! As always, if you have any comments, queries, or conundrums about the content above, leave a comment or shoot us an email!

Bath bombs are one of my favorite products to use and make. They can be incredibly affordable and require only a little time. With that said, despite my love of bath bombs, they have also been some of the more finicky products I’ve made. Bath bombs that crack, are too soft, don’t fizz, and more, are very common issues many DIY enthusiasts frequently experience. As a result, the below article will be a brief guide to getting started, including some important tidbits about the ingredients you chose to make your bath bomb and problems you may experience, to make your bath bomb making experience way more enjoyable :).

Basic ingredients to make a Bath Bomb

2 parts baking soda

1 part citric acid

A splash of moisture

Mold of choice

Directions:

Mix all of the dry ingredients well in a large bowl before adding a splash of moisture (about ½-3 tsp depending on your batch size)

Pack your mixture into your mold of choice. You can either unmold right away (or after 10-20 seconds) and make multiple bath bombs with a single mold or leave the mixture in the mold to dry.

Wait 12-24 hours for your bath bombs to dry before using them or wrapping them up for a gift.

Image from Milky Way, a bath bomb and soap mold supplier.

Optional add in’s

1-2 parts salt of choice: Options here include Epsom salt (not actually a salt and very rich in magnesium), dead sea salt (another magnesium rich ingredient), sea salt, Himalayan salt, etc. While magnesium rich ingredients are great for muscle soothing baths, they also are a bit trickier to work with compared to sea salts since they tend to absorb more water - too much Epsom or dead sea salt, especially if you have slightly too much moisture in your mixture or are working in higher humidity, may cause your bath bombs to fizz out (the citric acid react prematurely), leaving your bath bombs soft, crumbly and not fizzy once they hit the bathtub. If you opt for either of these salts, consider using less moisture, not using water, and perhaps even adding your hydrating ingredient of choice to them, waiting 10-20 minutes before mixing in the rest of your ingredients. If you live in a very low humidity environment (or have a dehumidifier), you less likely to have these problems with magnesium-rich ingredients.

A few tbsps of clay: Great natural color additives and can also give the bath bombs a smoother look. If you’re struggling with too much moisture in your bath bombs, clay can also help dry the mixture out a bit to prevent premature citric acid reactions. Note, a little bit goes a long way, too much will result in bath bombs that are next to impossible to unmold without cracking and possibly crumbly if you do end up successfully taking them out of the mold. Click here for more information about different clay options.

Other color additives of choice: There are so many color additives to chose from, but for bath bomb making, I think botanical options are excellent easy and eco-friendly ingredients to turn to. These ingredients include beetroot for a red to pink color, turmeric for a yellow, spirulina or other greens for a green, etc. Be careful with the amount you add it, too much may stain your tub. Note, I’ve seen activated charcoal become a pretty popular color additive (mostly added for it’s touted health effects)... I would probably not do this in any amount because this ingredient will definitely stain your tub!

Essential Oils: These are great natural aroma options for your bath bombs and also give some additional benefits, e.g. lavender after a stressful day, citrus as a morning energizer, eucalyptus for congestion. When you're using essential oils, be sure to dilute them to 3% (read this article for more information on that), use a carrier oil (this will make them safer for your skin and will also help prevent early evaporation), and make sure the essential oils you're using are safe for your skin and the user (e.g. don’t use cinnamon bark period, I would also consider not using, for example, eucalyptus essential oils (or others rich in 1-8, cineole) for young children). Note, some essential oils may add a bit of color to your bath bomb mix.

Herbs, flowers, other botanicals: These are great for decorating your bath bombs! You can either intersperse these ingredients all throughout the mix or place them at the bottom of your molds (a small pinch) before you pack your mixture and mold. I personally love the look of tea, rose petals, calendula and pink Himalayan salt on the tips of bath bombs.

1 part cornstarch or arrowroot powder: These ingredients will help you achieve a smoother looking bath bomb. If you're struggling with the moisture level in your bath bombs, both of these ingredients will also help absorb some of the mixtures. If you’re using a mechanical bath bomb press, I would consider not using these ingredients. For an unknown reason to me, these ingredients have only given me a hard time with this type of bath bomb mold but not with the hand-mold options (see below).

Note, this is by no means the limit for the add-in options, but for ‘natural’ ingredients, this is most of them! If you have any other add-ins you like to use, tell us about them in the comments below!

What kind of ‘moisture’ should you use?

Typically, you can hydrate your bath bombs with any of the following ingredients: water, witch hazel, oil and/or alcohol. The amount of moisture you incorporate into your batch depends, in addition to your batch size, a lot on the type of liquid you use, as they all have slightly different effects. Bath bombs are notoriously finicky and this is a big reason why, but knowing a bit more about each of the ingredients can make your life a lot easier when making these products

Water: The trickiest of the hydrating ingredients. Since water evaporates very slowly compared to the ingredients with alcohol (includes witch hazel), the margin of error is a lot smaller. As a result, a wee bit too much water will cause your bath bombs to fizz out, which may take a few hours. If you put way too much water right from the start, you may get a bit of a volcano effect in your bowl and will have to start from scratch again. I would personally recommend not using water.

Oil: If you're using essential oil in your bath bombs, you should definitely use at least a little bit of carrier oil. This will make the essential oil a lot safer for your skin and also help prevent the essential oils from evaporating too early. I tend to prefer using rice bran oil, although most carrier oils will work. I find that olive oil is by far the hardest carrier oil to use for me in bath bombs, probably due to how heavy this oil is comparatively. Butters can be added into your bath bombs as well (i.e. shea or cocoa butter), but keep in mind, they’ll be going down the bathtub drain and may not be the nicest for your plumbing.

Witch Hazel or Alcohol: Witch hazel is my go-to for bath bombs. Because witch hazel is usually an extract in an alcohol, it evaporates much quicker than water and is significantly easier to use. I also find that having witch hazel in my recipes instead of water helps the bath bombs unmold a lot easier instead of sticking to the molds and pulling each side apart. Many bath bomb makers choose to use rubbing alcohol instead of witch hazel… rubbing alcohol is by far the easiest ingredient to use to hydrate your bath bombs since it barely reacts with the citric acid and evaporates even faster. As a result, you can have a wetter mixture, which will be much easier to pack and unmold, that won’t cause the fizzing out you’d get with water and even witch hazel. If you chose to use rubbing alcohol, your mixture will smell like that ingredient until the bath bomb dries and the alcohol has evaporated.

Note, I would consider using a spray bottle for the water, witch hazel or alcohol for ease of use and less risk of over-hydrating your bath bomb mix.

Note, if you live in a very humid environment, you may not even need to add water or witch hazel, especially if you're using an ingredient rich in magnesium. A dehumidifier may also be a good idea.

What type of mold should you use?

There are so many mold options out there for bath bombs. The most popular are the two-part spherical molds, which often come in either plastic or stainless steel. If you’re planning on making multiple bath bombs in a sitting with a hand mold option, I would opt for the stainless steel since it’s way easier to unmold and a lot more sturdy compared to plastic molds. Flexible silicone molds can be nice, especially if you want to make cute shapes out of your bath bombs. If you use these molds, I wouldn’t bother trying to unmold your bath bombs until they’re dry… unless you're an expert bath bomb unmolder… You can also use just about any jar to make your bath bombs. When I first started making bath bombs, I used to make them in shallow coffee cups… press the mixture in, and then flip the cup over to slowly tap the bath bomb out of the cup. While this is definitely not the easiest method, you can still make really lovely bath bombs like this if you have the patience or touch... If you're interested in making a significant bath bomb investment, you could also consider buying a mechanical bath bomb press. Here’s the one that I use, which I really like, but there are a lot more on the market :).

Possible Problems and Solutions

Bath bombs that crack: It’s possible that you added slightly too much water, causing the bath bomb to expand as it dried. If your bath bomb cracked or crumbled before dry (e.g. sitting on a table or upon unmold), you may not have enough moisture. Note, witch hazel or rubbing alcohol will make your life easier!

Bath bombs that are too soft: You’ve likely added too much oil or used too heavy of an oil, for example, olive oil. Alternatively, too much water or witch hazel, too humid of an environment, or the last two reasons plus the addition of magnesium-rich ingredients (e.g. Epsom salt) can also do this, often with a slight fizzing out effect. Try putting more dry ingredients, such as more baking soda. You may also want to try incorporating some clay or cornstarch to absorb some of the moisture.

Bath bombs that aren’t fizzing: A few things could have gone wrong here. You’ve either put too much water or witch hazel or may have too humid of an environment, which may have reacted prematurely with the citric acid, or added too little citric acid. Alternatively, corn starch or too much oil in the mixture can also reduce the frizziness.

Bath bombs are sticking to the mold: This could be due to a few things. If you’re using water, I would definitely consider switching over to witch hazel or rubbing alcohol, as they make the unmolding process a lot easier. You also may not have enough moisture in your mixture, causing the bath bombs not to pack well enough. Finally, if you're still having problems, you may want to also consider the baking soda you're using. While the differences among baking soda are slim, I’ve found that Arm and Hammer baking soda is by far the easiest baking soda option to use.

Image from Primal Elements

Note, when your bath bombs are dry, store them in a covered container, for example, like a cookie jar or baggie. Opt for packaging that won’t absorb moisture, e.g. cardboard or wood. This will help keep the aroma of your essential oils intact and prevent them from evaporating.

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https://theecowell.com/blogs/well/clays-1012017-11-03T05:54:00-04:002017-11-03T05:55:19-04:00Which clay is best for your skin type?Jen Novakovich

Clays are an incredibly popular ingredient across several industries. In general, they're material taken from the earth that's composed of fine particles of hydrous aluminum silicates and other minerals, for example, magnesium, iron, alkali metals, etc.Clay minerals form over large periods of time due to gradual chemical weathering and rock erosion, and are often found in sedimentary rocks.They're used industrially, environmentally, in medical settings, in our food and more. In cosmetics, clays can be used in just about any products out there for a variety of purposes; make-up, cleansers, facial masks, lotions, toothpaste, you name it. There is a huge variety of clays in nature, differing in composition, color, and effects in cosmetics. As a result, a little know-how about clays will go along for your DIY Beauty recipes. This article will explore the in's and out's of clays and things you should know about them when choosing a clay type for your recipes.

Definitions related to clay:

Cation-exchange capacity (CEC): the degree that a substance can absorb and exchange cations (positively charged ions). e.g. Montmorillonite clays (higher complexity structure) have the highest CEC rate (70 meq/g), Illite with around 30 meq/g and kaolinite (lowest complexity in structure) at around 6 meq/g. This affects cosmetics because a higher CEC value will mean the clay may be better able to remove positively charged oils and impurities from your skin. This is one of the most important factors in clays.

Absorb: clay pulling into itself, which will cause the clay to swell.

Adsorb: clay pulling to its surface... will not draw oils or swell.

There are 3 types of clay types commonly used in cosmetics: Smectite (montmorillonite), Illite, and Kaolinite. These 3 types of clay all have different characteristics and make for products that are more soothing, more drying, more astringent, more matte, and so on and so forth. Clays found in cosmetics are generally mixtures of different clay minerals, typically with 1-2 being predominant, which will have a big impact on the end formulating effects of these ingredients.

Smectite (Montmorillonite) Clays

This group of clays is characterized by their expandable (swelling) properties and their ability to absorb impurities and oils (e.g. high absorption capacity/high cation-exchange capacity CEC) compared to other clay groups. This is because these clays are extremely fine-grained with a lot of surface area and also organized into thin layers with loosely bound ions where organic matter can be trapped between. As a result, as oils and water become trapped between these layers, smectite clays will swell. Montmorillonite is by far the most popular clays of this group used in cosmetics and is the main constituent in, for example, bentonite clay. Most clays contain montmorillonites to some degree.

*Typically best suited for normal to oily skin types.

Here are a few examples:

Bentonite Clay: formed by alterations of volcanic glass to clay minerals that are less than 0.005mm in size, these are essentially volcanic ash weathering products, consisting of volcanic ash and montmorillonite. These clays have either sodium or calcium oxides. Sodium is by far more common and also aids to a clay that can absorb to a much higher degree (more exchangeable ions, therefore, more swelling). Bentonite clays can absorb about 50 times its own weight, swelling to form gels. These clays have been used historically in cosmetics in over 200 cultures for sprains, bruises, foot powders, insect bites, face masks, etc. Quite drying, especially the sodium type - recommended only once per week and not for people with sensitive or dry skin.

Red (Montmorillonite) Clay: this red colored clay is red due to its iron oxide richness. Like the other montmorillonite clays, this clay is exceptional at drawing oils and impurities from your skin and often used for sore muscles, aches, cleansers and as a natural color additive in soaps and makeup. Very drying, recommended only once per week and not for people with sensitive or dry skin.

French Green Clay: Also known as "sea clay", these clays are typically either made up of mostly montmorillonite or illite clays. While different chemically and should be described separately, they both have relatively similar properties. These clays consist of volcanic ashes, plant matter (which give the green color), iron oxides, clay minerals and a variety of other minerals. The illite type is non-swelling and typically found in the north of France or in the Atlantic Basin. The montmorillonite type is mostly found in the south of France. These clays are best used for oily and acne-prone skin as they are exceptional at absorbing oils and impurities, recommended only once per week.

Rhassoul Clay: Part of the smectite (swelling) group of clays, this clay is rarer and more luxurious, very rich in minerals. Rhassoul clay is found in the Atlas mountains of Morocco and is excellent at absorbing oils and impurities, quite astringent, and seems to be effective at improving the overall look of a variety of skin types. Rich in trace elements such as silica, magnesium, iron, calcium, etc, and as a result, a favorite among many spas. While most skin types can tolerate this clay, if you have dry to sensitive skin, do a patch test or perhaps consider hydrating rhassoul clay with an oil instead of water. Best suited for normal to oily or acne-prone skin types.

Illite Clays

These clays are non-expanding but still quite absorptive, even more absorptive than montmorillonite clays. This is because Illite clays seem to have a highly porous crystal structure. As a result, they're typically more drying and very good at removing impurities. The best-known type of clay in this group is french green clay. Illite clays are typically found in marine shales and related sediments.

*Typically best suited for normal to oily skin types.

Here are a few examples:

French Green Clay: See above.

French Red Clay: Very absorptive, like the other illite clays, and also contains quite a bit of montmorillonite and kaolin. These clays are colored red due to their high content of iron and copper oxides. French Red Clay is typically found in the North of France and Atlantic basin. Very rich in minerals, nonswelling but excellent at drawing oils and impurities and overall, very purifying. Best used for normal to oily to acne-prone skin types or as a nice natural color additive option in, for example, soap or facial powders. For facial masks, recommended only once per week.

French Pink Clay: Not mined to be pink, this clay is a mixture of red illite and white kaolin. As a result, this clay is much a gentler purifier and works well on mature and more sensitive skin types, touted as one of the mildest clays out there. French Pink Clay is also a nice natural color additive option in, for example, soap or mineral makeup, very widely used in this part of the cosmetic industry among manufacturers.

Kaolinite Clays

These clay minerals are the main ingredients in kaolin (China) clay. Kaolin clays aren't absorptive but they do adsorb (holds impurities on its surface), they are a non-swelling clay with low cation-exchange capacities. Used predominantly in cosmetics as a bulking agent but are also quite useful for sensitive to dry skin types in cleansing products since they are one of the mildest clays.

*Typically best suited for sensitive to dry skin types

Here are a few examples:

White Kaolin Clay: Also known as China or white cosmetic clay, this is the most widely used clay in cosmetics due to its adsorbent properties. White Kaolin is white due to its high aluminum content and is the mildest of the cosmetic clays, playing an important role in products like makeup (e.g. a base ingredient), perfumery, and more. These clays adsorb impurities without removing the natural oils on our skin, making it well suited for dry to sensitive skin types as well as an exceptional ingredient to use in mineral makeup.

French Pink Clay: See above.

Red (Kaolin) Clay: Otherwise known as Moroccan red clay, found in the Atlas Mountains in Morocco and also contains illite and montmorillonite clay minerals. Rich in iron oxides, clay is highly adsorbent and does an excellent job drawing oils and impurities from the skin. Red kaolin clay is a strong cleansing clay, suitable for normal to oily skin types and not the greatest option for dry to sensitive skin types. Red kaolin is also a nice natural color additive option in, for example, soap.

Tips on using clays in DIY Beauty

Clays are an excellent ingredient to use in face masks, especially if you tend to get congested pores or oily skin. Look for clays suited to your skin type when choosing a clay type. Hydrate your clay by adding it to water (or the alternative, I prefer adding it to water though for ease of mixing) while stirring until you get a thick paste, which you can use as a face mask. If you tend to have dry or sensitive skin, hydrating your clay with an oil may be a good idea.

Try adding clay to your next body butter or lotion, whisking well into your end product. Incorporating clay into your formulas, depending on the clay used, may aid to a less greasy, more matte end product (especially if formulating water/surfactant-free), may aid to deodorizing effects (e.g. clay based deodorants for the win!), and may bulk up your product to a silkier consistency.

Clays, especially of the kaolin type, are lovely ingredients to use in mineral makeup recipes, for example, compact or loose facial powders. You can achieve a nicely colored end-product by using a mixture of clays, such as brown, pink, yellow and white kaolin clays, which will make for a skin-colored end product. Stay tuned for a post on color additives in cosmetics, which would also be potential add-ins to these types of products.

Try using clays in your next soap, bath bomb or facial scrub to add color and a purifying bonus effect. In soaps, clays also aid for a lovely creamy lather with a nice slip (bentonite clay), perfect for shaving bars. In bath bombs, clay can help hold up their shape, granted you don't put much, which will cause them to crumble. If you're struggling with humidity in bath bomb making, which can cause bath bombs to not dry and fizz out (i.e. the citric acid will react prematurely), a little clay may help save your batch due to its moisture absorbing properties.

Store your clays in a cool and dry area so you don't end up with any moisture in your clay.